Greetings everyone.
I have a question in regards to a whinning noise that I feel is coming from the front end. The faster you go the louder it gets. If you you are crusing and put the car in neutral you still have the same sound. There is no difference in sound when cornering or turning the wheel. I think it may be the bearing. I have been told that if it was the wheel bearing the sound would change while cornering. I have also been told that it may be outter transmission bearing????

Any suggestions or experience with this problem? Any help would be appreciated. Thanks Simon

 

I just replaced my wheel bearings and before I replaced them, i did not notice any difference in the noise Whe I was turning or going straight. I have a write up to replace them if you would like it, email me, swallace@sc.rr.com

Sidney

 

It could be the drivebelts, PS pump or wheel bearing. Find out if the sound stops when the car isn't moving. If it doesn't then that rules out the wheel bearings. Next try to locate where in the drivebelt area it is coming from.

 

There is no sound when the car is at a stop. Only when it is moving. Again, the sound intensity is directly proportional to the speed of the wheels turning, not the engine rpm.

Thanks for the reply

Simon

 

I also have a whining that seems to be coming from the front of the car when the engine is on. I also noticed that after a stop, the whining will "whine" up with the RPM.

I took this problem to my mechanic, who used to be a Nissan Tech... which probably doesn't mean anything to anyone; we'll see. He says that the noise is coming from the Power Steering pump. He said something about the bearings on it not being the best and so a little bit of grinding is going to occur, unless you put some really really good power steering fluid and conditioner into it. But! he says, if it's already making that whiny noise... there not a lot of sense in putting all that expensive fluid in it since the bearings seem have been grinded on already. He also said that with the 3Gen Maximas, there is an expected amount of whine noise.

His suggestion to me was to change out the pump, but that's a couple hundred bucks I think. It all depends on whether or not you can live with the noise or not... but since I can't hear your Maxima's whine... you better have a real mechanic listen to it... someone you trust preferably... some mechanics will try to get you... in fact THERE'S ONE NOW JUST BEHIND YOU!!!!

just kidding..... (lame)

 

Well then, what does it mean if your hear a whining around a certain RPM? I hear a high pitched whinning noise from the front of my car at around 1900rpm, but I usually don't notice it because I drive with my windows down, and the wind usually blocks it out.

 

could be the alternator

 

GO to the salvage yard and pick up a power steering pump for $40. Make sure it is not full of residue, for that means it already leaks.

 

Have you recently changes out the t-blet? If so, the whinning noise would occur if the tensioner was too tight. THis is not a bad thing, better loose than tight, but you have to make sure the drive belts aren't too tight because crank shafts have been known to break at the sprocket. BTW, at idle the t-belt noise is minimal, but get under the hood and throttle the engine to see if the noise increases.

 

No work has been done to the engine recently. I did some more checking under the hood and found that there is no sound when at a stand still. I raised the rpm to 2500 and nothing. Power steering pump did not seem to be making any excessive noise (or any noticable noise)I think I may try the wheel bearings first, relatively inexpensive and with 185k they probably could use a change. Thanks for the input guys, I will post my findings.

 

I hope when you say wheel bearings you mean your axels or something. I'm not a very "lingo" Maxima driver.

Anyway..... everyone in the back is laughing. If the wheel bearings is the axel, then good! Otherwise you should make sure your CV outer boot is not broken.

 

Wheel bearings and axle are 2 different parts.

 

Like sxwk12 said the axle and wheel bearing are two different things. If the noise does not change when the wheel turns then my guess is that there is something else wrong with your car. But what the he$$, if you can do the work yourself, go right ahead and do the bearing. Good luck......