Intermittent Screech + Steering Wobble Front Right Tire

[ztrain727]

Yeah I found moog's at pepboys. Cost more than OEM, so I grabbed a couple from the dealership. I'm not interested in saving a few bucks for the hassle of a poor fit. 

Anyway, here's the scoop! The car was on a donut when this last wobble happened because a rear tire had irreparable damage and the local tire shop put the donut front right of all places. I drove to a better tire shop, the bad wobble started after ~1hr20 of driving, up hill, 55mph just before arriving at the shop. Got 4 new tires. I let the car sit overnight. Next day, totally smooth driving again, as if nothing had happened. 

I talked to three mechanics. One at the dealership. He thought tranny or cv since it usually was worst up hill, under torque. Next mechanic (independent) also thought it sounded like a potential intermittent cv binding. Third mechanic (independent, foreign specialist) actually had some availability to look at the car. He took it for a rowdy test spin, cornering, braking, up hills, etc and couldn't reproduce it. He also confirmed front ball joints are bad, but wasn't so sure about the cv, etc. Basically, without reproducing the wobble, he couldn't diagnose it. 

I got a tube of cv grease, injected what I could into the little (~1/2") hole in the outter right boot and drove home keeping it under 55mph. No issues. I immediately put the infrared camera on it. Again, no obvious hot spots. Hub nuts around 140*F, cv axle shaft around 110-120, tranny at 180. Nothing really stood out, though it was dark and the car was on the ground.

Also, no noises, clicking, grinding, etc. 

I'm starting to like the theory of intermittent cv binding from the torn boot. Idea is, after a long drive, things have heated up a bit, cv has spit off some grease, suddenly it gets torqued hard, possibly changing the angle slightly, and there's a metal on metal spot that starts binding. After cooling overnight, it gets skimmed with a little grease and runs smooth again for a while. This might also explain the rotor rubbing that time, as in the joint binding there doesn't let the wheel spin true, causing the rotor rub at that one point along the rotation. This cv is a pulled subaru part, 130k miles i recall, and has been on a couple years. The boot tear is small enough it's conceivable it has been loosing a little grease for some time.

If I go with this theory, I need to decide stat if I should try and rush order an OEM outter boot, or get a local reman axle. I avoided the reman axles last time, but not sure if the cv would have sustained damage at this point. I'm all for jacking it up on all fours, but can't seem to reproduce the wobble again right now. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[1 Lucky Texan]

ztrain - if all 4 tires are not identical, you need to use the FWD fuse. Is the donut still on the car?

[ztrain727]

Oooops... I remember the FWD fuse very clearly on my '97 legacy, but I somehow never noticed it on this vehicle and never saw it in the manual. I just checked the manual, and sure enough, under spare tire information, there is a little note about the FWD fuse. I'd always used the index to go straight to the tire changing section, which begins on the next page. 

Have I possibly damaged the differential?

[1 Lucky Texan]

it isn't good for it. Causes torque bind on dry pavement.

I doubt anyone can say how 'much' damage is done.

 

[ztrain727]

Hmmm could it explain the intermittent wobble? Keeping in mind this did not originally happen with the donut on, but a few months after another fairly substantial drive with the donut on the rear right and no FWD fuse.

 

Makes me think twice about investing too much time on the cv axle/boot since it's just a theory. At the very least I will pack it full of grease and monitor things for a while.

[1 Lucky Texan]

try driving with and without the fuse.

[ztrain727]

When the wobble happens I assume you mean? Right now it's driving smooth.

To see if it's the cv, a guy at the dealership said throw it in neutral if it's wobbling and see if it goes away. Sort of makes sense, except the cv's are still spinning, just not torqued I'd assume. 

[ztrain727]

I rented a pickle fork to do the ball joints tonight. PB blaster on the castle nut and pinch bolt. Heat on the pinch bolt too I've read. Do I have to replace it anyway? If so, I may drill it too. 

I'm trying to decide what to do for the CV axle torn outer boot. I'm driving a few hundred miles for a wedding end of the week, so immediate options are: 

1. Buy a cardone reman axle from NAPA for $60. Maybe eat the core fee and keep the original. 

2. Inject a bunch of CV grease into the small tear temporarily. I've read mixing CV grease is a bad idea. This would just be for this one trip til I can order an OEM boot and pull the axle. 

3. Leave it alone for now. See if the wobble comes back. 

Since it's a subaru axle and not clicking, my preference is to keep the axle, regrease and reboot in the near future, but take whatever precautions before this long drive. 

[1 Lucky Texan]

get a used Subaru axle from car-part.com . Reboot it now if you want or, put it on, watch it, re-boot the present one at your leisure if you feel it's OK inside.

[forester2002s]

As a temporary measure, you could wrap the split boot with plastic-wrap (eg Saran wrap), followed by a covering of duct-tape.

This will temporarily reduce loss of grease, and contamination by 'dirt'.

But this will only help if the split is caught early on.

[heartless]

don't bother with the aftermarket axles - nothing good ever comes from them.

get a good used one and reboot as Texan suggested.

[ztrain727]

Thank you guys! I was looking at re-manufactured axles not china ones (I guess A-1 cardone remans axles for subaru, but it's $220 at the dealership vs. $60 at NAPA, both cardone). I think my axle is fine though. It's a pulled subaru axle with ~140k miles on it, I think a regrease and reboot is what I need. Do I search "Axle Assy Fr" on car-part.com? 

Spent a hellish day trying to get the ball joints separated. Got one pinch bolt out, broke the other and drilled it for a nut and bolt. Then spent a good 4-5 hrs prying, slamming, cranking - every trick in the book to try and separate the ball joint. I was trying to do it on the car to avoid an alignment, and finally admitted defeat and took the knuckle off and went to a machine shop. I had completely stripped the 19mm threads trying to screw it off, so he welded on a nut and threaded in a slide hammer. Those threads stipped too. He resorted a sledge and an incredible mix of chisels, prying the knuckle and hammering at an angle. 1/2 hr of that and I was ready to give up, when it suddenly popped. Came out literally with a small handful of rust. 

I guess on the bright side, with the knuckle off, I can confirm the bearings spin smooth and feel solid. I could easily swap the axle right now too, but as said, I think it's fine and don't want to cut the bands til I have replacements on hand. I could spin the cv axle too while it's free. Anything else I should look at while it's apart. 

I must say I am so thankful for all the knowledge and information on here and the forums. It's great seeing people help people, and there's a lot of closet geniuses out there. 

 

 

[heartless]

9 hours ago, ztrain727 said:

I think my axle is fine though. It's a pulled subaru axle with ~140k miles on it, I think a regrease and reboot is what I need. Do I search "Axle Assy Fr" on car-part.com? 

 

search for "axle shaft" - on the next screen it will ask you front or rear

[ztrain727]

Ok, thank you! Looks like there's a few not too far. 

I must have been delirious last night. I took another look at the knuckle/hub today and this is what I saw: 

https://youtu.be/Q9-EmTRsniA

Looks like you all were right all along... I guess the stuck ball joint was the universe telling me to take off the knuckle. I assume I should just do both at 207k miles. NAPA has seals and ATM bearings. Can't find any info on them. I doubt O'reilley or Autozone would have anything better. I can drive an 1-1/2hrs to the nearest dealership, but I hear OEM bearings aren't great either. 

Good news is I found a good little machine shop in town. I'm sure he can press them. 

Should have done this to begin with, but thank you all for your patience and help. 

[heartless]

6 hours ago, ztrain727 said:

NAPA has seals and ATM bearings.

you want NTN bearings.. or is that NKN?? dang it all..

paging @GeneralDisorder

Edited July 17, 2019 by heartless

[ztrain727]

Haha NTN - also Koyo - all sold under Timken's distribution. As I understand, they are all essentially OEM quality bearings.

That said, I can't get any locally and need the car together by tonight. I think I'll order a timken for the other side off RockAuto and for this side, fingers crossed it lasts a bit.  

 

 

[1 Lucky Texan]

I would have no hesitation using Timken on an older car. Indeed, Subaru wheel bearings fail often enough that I'm not convinced there's all that much special about OEM in this application.

[ztrain727]

So I've read too! I was relieved however to find that the bearing NAPA had was a Koyo, and the seals were all made in Japan. Not bad for a small town parts store. They put some real muscle on the 25 ton press to get the race out. They had bigger presses, but I was worried they'd damage the spindle. Hub and spindle were both fine though. 

I'm still considering getting a whole knuckle off a lower miles, not rust belt car to do the other side. It's a fight every step of the way. Also noticed yesterday the driver CV inner boot is in two pieces. I think since that axle is original, wouldn't hurt to replace and reboot it with a lower mile pulled part as well. 

Thanks again everyone! At least I'll get one side done...

 

Quick Question:

With the camber bolt (top of the two lower strut bolts), re-align the mark on the bolt head to the strut mark and just crank the nut to torque (130ft lb I believe), correct? i.e. nut alignment doesn't matter. Can I put a few hundred miles on the car without an alignment for the camber? I've read it's not a huge deal, and want to wait to align it til I've done the other side. 

Edited July 19, 2019 by ztrain727