Hey everyone! New to the forums here!

I took my mothers car to do the lower control arm bushing and noticed quite the howl when I was driving it. It has about 135,000 miles on it. Of course I immediately thought wheel bearing, as that is what it sounds very similar to. As I took the car apart I checked them and they are actually tight. But what happens is I spin the wheels and the noise is coming from the transmission/diff. Here's the kicker. I jack the front end up, spin the wheel in neutral and it makes the noise, only if I spin the fire forward, not reverse. If I put it in park, it pops, I assume the park pin going in, then it doesn't make the noise anymore. Put it back in neutral, noise again. I have a video on YouTube so you can hear it. The reason I ask here is to see if this is some common issue that maybe someone's run into before. Thank you everyone!

 

Welcome to the site!
The hub bearing might be tight but still noisy, it could be an output bearing where the drive axle hoes into the trans.

 

What's getting me is when I spin the wheel when it's in park, and as soon as it pops, the noise stops, did you see in video?

 

Brake pad wear indicator?

 

No I couldn't open the link to your video

 

I don't know why it didn't link correctly, if you copy and paste it into the browser it'll go to it

 

They do make a noise when you jack the wheels up and use the engine to turn the wheels. That is the inner slip joint over extending from hanging down too far.

 

I've never heard a car or truck with cv axles make that noise jacked up, and why does it stop once it's in park?

 

Mine make the same noise jacked up on one side could be the spider gears in the transaxle turning , they won't turn in park.

 

I'll have to take a closer look in the morning. I don't want to be overthinking something stupid. I'd love for it to be a wheel bearing. 1/2 hour job in these things.