choopes

My 1993 coupe has been making a sound from the front. The local Chevy dealer thought it was brake caliper. I had them replaced it. But the sound is still there. A sort of a woosh-woosh that gets faster as I speed up. Also, this noise goes away completely when i put any pressure on the brake pedal. The sound comes from the left front. Not too long ago I did have the right front wheel bearing changed. No noise on this one. The service ABS & service ASR lights were always on. The chevy dealer did correctly diagnose this one. Changed the bearing, and both lights went out. I'm thinking because one front bearing went out, the other may be bad too. So like the blindfolded dart thrower, I'm about to spin around 3 times and try to hit a bullseye by replacing the other front wheel bearing. I used a Timken on the right one. Is that the best to get now days? No longer available at autozone. So where is a good source? I searched for a step by step, but couldn't find one. Lots of other good info, but do I need an impact wrench, or special tools? btw. The 6 & 12 o'clock shake reveals no looseness. Any ideas or suggestion?
THANKS!

BrianCunningham

bearings make a clicking sound if you shack the tire while it's up in the air

choopes

It's not doing that. Must be something to do with the brakes

hcbph

Do your brake pads have a wear indicator on them? Are they wearing even? Is the caliper hanging and not sliding like it should? Chance the brake isn't releasing fully due to a bad hose or issue in the abs pump?

Sure sounds to be brake related.

choopes

I don't think the pads are wearing unevenly. I'll look at them this weekend again to be sure. They do move. I wasn't sure if they were supposed to. Thanks for that info.
If it were a ABS issue wouldn't I have an indicator light? That system works.

hcbph

The calipers need to slide so it 'self adjusts' as the brake pads wear, keeping the caliper centered.
On the abs, if you got 'crap' into it and it was plugging one of the little holes, maybe not.

Christi@n

Bad Bearings should make a humming noise (woosh woosh seems to be) when turn wheels, do they make it?or just a clicking sound??

If it is a click are you sure is it came from front? Usually clicking sound is from rear teflon washer, on rear wheel hub, and lack of grease

yd328

I usually find with the front wheel bearings the humming gets louder or will diminish while turning side to side. It gets louder loading the bearing, turning right if its the left bearing. Then it will get quiet turning left, unloading or taking the pressure off the bearing.
If it goes away with any application of the brakes I would lean towards a pad and/or rotor issue. Also, Check that the splash shield is not close enough to make contact with the rotor.

Gary

Purple92

Many times on C4's - as the front wheel bearings get worn - you will notice that the brake pedal goes a bit further down on the first slow down after a period of brake free driving. What is happening is that the worn bearing is allowing the rotor to "wobble" a bit and this tends to push the pistons back into their bores - which requires more fluid to move them back when you apply the brakes. Did you notice that the brake pedal didn't do that as much after the one bearing was replaced ???

I'm assuming that you jacked the car up for the test where you grabbed the tire at 6 & 12 o'clock. Normally - that test will find pretty worn bearings pretty easily. So - if it revealed nothing - I would think brakes - not bearing.

As others have said - the woosh - woosh noise could easily be brake related - basically some small amount of run-out on something that rotates with the wheel is contacting something that's stationary. Are the brake pads relatively new - or have they been on the for a while ???

choopes

Those front brake pads have been on there 2-3k miles tops.
I have not noticed any further travel distance of the brake pedal. I would think I would have noticed that, but I wasn't really looking for it either.
Even though its not too many miles, maybe a set of front brake pads are in order.

scrappy76

Is it possible the rotor is slightly warped from overheating ?

Purple92

You can certainly try jacking up the corner in question, and rotating the tire by hand and seeing if you can hear any light rubbing. If you do - start disassembling and see what there is to see.... Many times - the answer will be obvious once you have the ability to actually see what's going on. And besides - doing that is free