Could somebody give me a hint or two on how to track down a kind of rumbling sound in my '88 Camry (SV21) with 200km.
1) This sound seems to be unaffected and unrelated to engine speed, steering and road surface. I'm not quite sure if it is influenced by the car speed. 2) The front right wheel has some play when I push and pull on the left and right sides of the wheel simultaneously. This play seems to be due to the tie rod end connection to the steering knuckle being loose. Pushing and pulling the wheel's top and bottoms gives no play. The front end was lifted up for this test. There is a bit of abnormal wear on the right tyre's outer edge but not much. Can I conclude that the wheel bearing is OK given that the top/bottom test is OK? 3) The same test on the front left wheel indicate nothing is wrong. 4) There is no wandering or play on the steering.The shock absorbers/control arms/steering have not been serviced for the last 100 kms. I'm not sure what the previous owner did for the first 100 kms.
From the symptoms and the tests can I conclude that it could only be the shock absorbers or control arms with the shock absorber the most likely culprit? This conclusion is based on the lack of correlation of the noise to the road surface. Perhaps this noise is due to some kind of natural resonance that is more likely due the shock absorber. Can the springs do this? What other test can you suggest? Does this kind of noise indicate a safety problem?