98 OBW 190K, Fixing problem after problem and I have a tie rod question. The tie rod that connects the steering rack to the knuckle. I am able to swivel both tie rods passenger and driver side by hand, is this a problem? should I be able to move them by hand. My other OBW I am unable to. Reason I looked was I have inner wheel balding on the driver side.

when you have the front wheels back on and secure.....grab the wheel (with the car off the ground obviously) at 3 and 9 o clock and give it a little wiggle side to side...if you have excessive play than chances are you need tie rods .....to check the ball joints you grab the tire at 12 and 6 and give her another shake again with excessive play it may mean you need ball joints.....now if you have play in both directions chances are it is wheel bearings.....its not all that likely that both the tierods and balljoints will go bad at the same time....but it is possible..... this check has always proved reliable for me.....

The wheel does not budge when its on the ground. I do hear a grinding noise from that wheel when I am driving.

i mean jack the car up so the wheel is hanging freely (like on a lift)....you can do it one side at a time if you like if you dont have jackstands and only have a jack.....stupid question but did you check your brakes?...... also when does the noise occur....at any speed?...when turning only?.....brakes on or off when noise occurs?.......again just double checking..are you sure its a grinding noise?.......(just tryin to get as much info as i can so i dont give you wrong theories or advice).....

If I jack the car up one side at a time, the wheel has no play. The grinding noise is when the car is in motion no brakes applied. if I am crusing down Rt1 it goes away. I hear it at slow speeds.

You probably have bad bearings. Not the end of the world. I need to do the rears on a 96 OBW, not fun

that doesnt really make any sense though......if it were wheel bearings chances are he would have play or the noise would increase with vehicle speed......and at 60 mph. on RT 1 they should be humming like no other.......kind of like the sound of an aggressive snow tire on asphalt.....are you sure that its coming from one of the wheel well areas and not driveaxles/trans/driveshaft.......if you say the brakes are good.....the only other thing i can think of at the moment is parts of the suspension (upper strut mount bearing maybe).......

jack up the car again and turn each wheel by hand, listening closely for the noise. if you can hear it, try to pinpoint where it is coming from. it could be brakes dragging,it could be a bent dust shield, it could be bearings, it could be a bad axle...it could be any number of things. You need to try to determine exactly where the noise is coming from.

 

Just because there is no play in the wheel when trying to "shake" it, does not mean the bearings are not starting to go...

also, if they are just starting, one may not actually hear them when moving at speed - the sound could be too high pitched to hear over road/wind/engine/tranny noise

(been there before)

 

just my .02 cents

+1^