Road noise, depends on steering

Swap wheels, if the noise moves or goes away, you've found the problem.

Sounds like a rear hub bearing is going. Jack it up and check the right rear. It may not have any play but still be bad. Usually you can stick a stethoscope on the hub and listen while you rotate the bearing and you can hear the bearing rumble.

If you don't have a stethoscope (which is likely the case) you can put a rubber hose on a socket extension with the other end to your ear, which works nearly as well. I'd still swap tires as a first tires attempt however.

"." wrote in news:mn3ci2$tkg$ snipped-for-privacy@speranza.aioe.org:

sounds like one or both of the CV joints are bad. You said you replaced the hub not the cv joint. that is a comon sympton of a cv. KB

That was my first thought, just because I had a bad CV joint for a LONG time (2 years?) and finally got tired of the noise whenever I turned left. It was cheaper to replace the whole axle than just the joints.

Click and Clack said that my replacement schedule was just fine :-)

Considerably less likely. A more common CV symptom is a popping, clicking, grinding or clunking.

Btw, should it not have been obvious, the rubber hose should fit tightly on the socket extension.

(OP) Yeah - I'm not getting anything I'd call CV symptoms - no clicks, nothing on low-speed corners. For what it matters, the boots look OK.

I have almost the same exact problem on my 1995 F150. Turn left and the hum ming noise gets louder. Turn right and it goes away. The steering seems fin e. The noise comes and goes by itself sometimes. Nothing gets hot or even v ery warm when I drive; not the rim, hub, not anything I check. I thought a bearing was going so I removed the front tires and the bearings look fine. However, when I remounted the tires the hum was gone for about 2 weeks, the n it returned, by itself. It has gone away by itself one time since then bu t is back now. Very curious.

I think you nailed it - I checked again, and there is play in the right rear. Either it's worse now, or I just missed it before. I'm going to replace it, see what happens.

G (OP)