Bad wheel bearing?
 

I have no symptoms aside from a roaring noise coming from the front right around 70-80mph. Around town it's unnoticeable.

It's definitely not the engine because I can put my foot on the clutch and let the rpm drop and the sounds stays consistent. It's speed variable, not RPM variable.

Tires are brand new, not even a month old, car was just aligned at the same time I got new tires. Entire steering and braking system was replaced/rebuilt about 7000 miles ago when I rebuilt the car. I'm thinking the last thing to replace would be wheel bearings.

I've already got the wheel bearings for the rear of the car. I found some front hubs ("United" Brand) on ebay brand new for 80 dollars a set which is less then half of what o'reilly wants for a set. Also, Mazda dealerships are selling the same parts you get at a parts store for these hubs which is a Federal Mogul/BCA Part.

Any other ideas on what it could be that I'm missing?

If it's a wheel bearing the noise sound be amplified when you turn the wheel, so taking corners the sound sound get a lot louder then if you were driving straight...

Hope that helps


J.

I guess it's amplified, it just seems to change slightly, but it's hard to do hard turns at 80 miles an hour lol.

Depending on how bad the bearing condition is,you can feel roughness when you rotate the hub by hand(of course you remove the wheel first).

Back in my old Skip Barber days we would kind of hug the tire at the 9 and 3 o'clock position and with our hands grip the inside of the tirewall rim area. Then you just rock the wheel back and forth, pushing in with one side of your body and pulling out with the other. If there is any play its in your wheel bearing. If its just a hint of play you should be fine but anything more you should change it. Hope that helps.

^^

Modern wheel bearings are slightly preloaded and there should be zero play. If there is any play, it is probably bad. Also, even if there is no play, it still could be failing. So the best way to find out, as mentioned above, is to rotate the hub/wheel and feel for roughness or to try to determine if cornering changes the noise/vibration level.

If it only occurs at higher speeds, it still could be a tire problem, even if the tires are new. Try rotating the tires front-to-rear and see if the symptoms chance.

I agree that it could still be a tire problem too.

A trick I learned to diagnose a bad wheel bearing is to hold on to the coil spring with someone spins the wheel. If you feel vibrations, then it's a bad bearing. The spring amplifies the vibrations. Do the other side too for a control.

And I agree that it could still be a tire problem too. I just experienced a similar problem that I at first suspected as a wheel bearing, but turned out to be a tire.

it could also be your inner wheel well skirt. they are problematic in the FDs and the left one especially likes to pop loose and rub on the tire along with the front main harness... body shops also love to leave shit like that loose just for kicks.

Confirmed one issue with the rear passenger wheel bearing. Pulled the wheel/brakes off and tried turning the axle shaft with it out of the differential and it felt gritty and difficult to turn. After taking the axle nut off I could see where the grease appeared cooked/burnt.

right now I've got them soaking in PB Blaster so I can hopefully hammer them out in the morning.

I ordered new front wheel bearings anyway just to knock them all out at the same time. Car has 107k on it and I'm about to install coilovers and put on some new wheels. It's a good time to go ahead and knock out this maintenance.