I have a strange humming sound that gets louder with speed. Got an alignment, then New tires... Am thinking it could be the front diff needs a fluid change. But figured I'd ask here first

 

sounds like a bad wheel bearing which seems to be common to go out early on these cars if youve hit a bad pot hole or curb,

 

With new tires it could be a bad tire. Try isolating where the sound is coming from by rolling the windows down and Listening. If your not running staggered set up move tires and see if the noise changes location.

056

 

^ yup that is a definite possibility though rare, bad tires do tend to make a humming sound.

 

How about cheap tires!! I actually have a humming sound but never really care because I have cheap tires!

 

Same issue here.. I have tell humming exactly at 60-65 and i can hear the change in my cupholder rattle slightly. Tried rebalancing, rotating, and alignments.. don't help

 

It happened with the tires I had, rotated them, still did it. Bought new tires last night, still does it. It seems to be from the front. I tried running in diff gears and the noise stays consistant. So it has to be something like a diff or transfer case. I'm coming up on 25k hard miles since I last changed fluid.

Any other ideas ?

 

sounds like a wheel bearing. does it get worse under harder braking? if so thats definately a possibility.

 

I never break hard, so ill try that, or I did notice it gets louder when I turn hard to the left. Good idea. Maybe ill check the bearing, any quick way to do that? And can I just replace the bearing, or do I have to do the entire spindle? Havnt had any problems with the car so havnt had to take anything apart

 

^ like i said before it does sound like a bad bearing, there is a complete DIY HEREon changing the wheel bearing which should help a lot

 

Thank you

 

Yea cheap tires can hum, as well as a tread seperating. since he said he just got new tires thats why I went there first. Number one rule of troubleshooting listen to all detials.

Wheel bearing Check: Jack up wheel you think has bad bearing. one hand on each side of tire and push in and out back and forth betwen each side of the tire. The tire should not really move if it does it could be wheel bearings or steering linkage. If the wheel bearing is just getting loose you may only see a very slight movement. you can also try on top and bottom of the tire. good luck.

056

 

I'll try it tonight... Also I just took a look at advance auto and they have the bearing for 18 dollars, does that sound right

 

Infiniti dealer replaced my bearing for free even though it was out of warranty. In fact, they said it was part of the 6 year/70k mile power train warranty. If your car still has less than 70k miles, you can have it replaced for free.

They first quoted me $428 for the repair, but then said it was covered by warranty. I doubt the part is only $18. The whole part comes as a wheel hub assembly, so I would imagine it would cost significantly more than that. My 2003 LS430 also had a wheel bearing issue and the dealer charged over $800 to replace.

The easiest way to tell if your bearing is bad from what I saw how the dealer checked it...is to jack up the car on all fours, have someone in the driver seat pushing the gas, and then listen to each wheel with a screwdriver to the ear to see if there are bearing problems as each wheel is spinning. It works best in AWD vehicles (since all wheels are spinning.)

Even if bearings are bad, the jiggle like the other posters mentioned above may be very slight it's almost unnoticeable. However, at higher speeds, even the smallest jiggle could cause noise.

 

In the diy posted earlier its not entire hub that needs replacing. But I will see tonight, and thanks for the info. I am way over the 70k mark at almost 120k