help with howl

I need some help tracking down a howl, I've searched on here and haven't been able to find this same situation.

I have a a very noticable howl that has sprung up recently. It comes on around 45mph and goes away shortly after 50mph. It also is there on deceleration, in fact might even be more noticable then. Also on deceleration it shows up around 25mph but not nearly as bad. It does it in gear and in nuetral, and also is directly related to mph and not rpm. Initially I thought it was tire realted since my M/Ts are somewhat noisey, I experimented with 25, 30, 35lbs in the tires with no difference. I've also jacked up the front(it seems as thought its coming from the front) and have no up/down or back and forth movement when wiggling the tires. I was thinking maybe gear whine in the front but have made no changes in anything up there to cause anything, so I changed out the gear oil in the front, no difference. Also nothing abnormal with the cover off.

if it gets worse - my guess would be front wheel bearings...what year?

Its a '98.

if the bearing assemblies have never been replaced - 8 years is def. time....specially if you have lots of miles - i think if you do a search, you'll find out that wheel bearings are typical repair after 8-10 years and cause those kinds of symptoms.

Second the wheel bearing. Although they often will show play when they wear out they sometimes will seem good and tight, but howl when the races become pitted. You can usually feel/hear the roughness when you spin the wheel.

agreed - mine didnt have any play....and i wasn't familiar enough with wheels to know whether or not they were spinning rough....

but the humming got worse and worse - eventually was almost constant. i guess they can lock up, which is extremely dangerous - so i got them on ebay - Timken brand - for about $250 for the pair.

Shop wanted $400 in parts, and $400 in labor - it was a full day trying to pull those rusted hub assemblies off, but well worth it - and a satisfying do it yourself job when you get back on the highway and its nice and quiet!!