Mcqueen

Car is back in the dealership this morning after getting it back Monday evening. Was originally brought in for annual inspection and winter wheel change, when the check engine light came on as I was leaving to go to the dealership. That MIL ended up being a vacuum issue on the air intake system. (ealier in the Summer I had another air intake system fault and an oil separator replaced (that wasn't cheap!!)). Now this one turned out to be a Throttle body gasket torn and leaking. So they replaced that. (fortunately this time parts and labor were cheap!) - A lot less than that oil separator! (It was actually more expensive to "Reset readiness SRT codes" on the itemized bill).

Anyhow drove the car home and then to and from work yesterday - noticed two issues. 1. Seemingly dramatic fuel economy drop - On my commute, though stop and go, I was driving as conservatively as possible and getting 10 mpg, max. 2. Muffled lawnmower-ish noise coming from up front (maybe passenger front engine bay), but only at speed. Noise is independent of the throttle, but gets louder and a higher pitched as the speed of the car increases. Again, hitting the throttle or lifting off the throttle does not change this noise, just changing speed. (when I first heard it, I thought I had a motorcycle in my blind-spot that I was hearing) Was concerned they might not hear the noise, but once it gets to 40 mph, it's hard to miss.

Anyone want to play "Click and Clack" and take a guess what I'm looking at?

Mcqueen

If you had "Front Right Wheel Bearing" - pat yourself on the back. Ugh,

tenspeed

I would have asked if it made more or less noise when the steering wheel was turned.

The strange thing is that a wheel bearing suddenly went bad after mounting the snow tires. My wheel bearing failures started with a little noise heard during turns and built up to hearing noise all the time.

Mcqueen

I heard noise all the time - when I brought it in to swap out wheels, I actually had that on my service order. They said the summers were worn/unevenly and causing the noise. (I will grant them that the noise I heard from the bearing after the snows were put on was much more distinct without the supplemental noise from the worn tires)