Wheel bearing or Uni Joint

[jeepbme]

Anyway to decifer between which one may have gone bad on a D30 front axle?

 

[ChiXJeff]

Yes, there is.

Oh, wait..... you actually want the details?

For u-joints, crawl under it and grab onto the inner yoke. It should be firmly fixed in place. If there's any motion in any direction (compared to the other yoke) the u-joint is shot.

Check the hub by jacking up the wheel, and see if you can rock the wheel in and out at several positions. Spin it, it should spin freely, and without a sandpaper feel.

 

[jeepbme]

I noticed yesterday when i was working on the front brakes the joint on the passenger side wiggled a little back and forth and side to side while the joint on the driver side was solid, just thought it was the way i had jacked it up. When i was on my way home from work today, a roaring started to occur when in straight line, but would lessin when i would swerve back and forth left to right.

Does that help diagnosis any?

 

[treedoc]

newbie response here.

replaced my u joints and hubs last week. popping on turns. ujoints were rust bombs. put it on jack stands and the hubs turned free and smooth, and wheels were steady. steering compnents were good. manually turned the tires (like steering by hand) and traced the noise to the u joints. unfortunately, destroyed both hubs removing them to get to the axles out.

$500 or so later, all is smooth and quiet.

 

[jeepbme]

howd you destroy the hubs... was it that hard to do?

 

[Rev Den]

I noticed yesterday when i was working on the front brakes the joint on the passenger side wiggled a little back and forth and side to side while the joint on the driver side was solid, just thought it was the way i had jacked it up. When i was on my way home from work today, a roaring started to occur when in straight line, but would lessin when i would swerve back and forth left to right.

Does that help diagnosis any?

Yup.....hubs.

Do a search for a whole bunch of installation advice.

Rev

 

[jeepbme]

when a say the "side" wiggled...i was referiing to the joint on the passenger side while the passenger side was soild.

Can it be driven either way?