Thread: Symptoms of bad wheel bearing and/or axle boot ripped?

I noticed about two weeks ago that my left front axle boot was ripped and leaking grease in my '97 200sx SE-R. It had not given me any noticeable problems until today.

Seemingly out of no where, the car began shaking mildly at about 40mph, but the steering wheel itself did not. As soon as I put it in neutral and coasted, it stopped. I first thought it was a loose wheel, so I got out and re-torqued all of the lug nuts, they were all snug. So I thought maybe it was one of those sections of the road where it's chopped up. Anyway I kept driving and it was fine and I got on a backroad which was smooth, and it started again, same thing, upon light/mild acceleration, shaking, put it in neutral, smooth. At this point I returned home and did some experimentation in my parking lot, on hard right turns under 15mph it shakes fairly violently, but not as bad as hard left turns.

To me this sounds like it could be either the left/right hub and/or bearing.. but I'm not sure if the front axle boot has anything to do with it or not. The car rides on Tein coilovers and 16" 205/45's if that helps.

Anyone experience these symptoms and what was the solution? THanks

Edit: The car has 180k on it, with the original motor mounts. I have the poly mounts sitting in my bedroom but haven't gotten around to installing them. I first thought it would be a bad mount since the shaking dissapears when coasting in neutral.

easy way to check jack the car up grab the tire and try to shake it from side to side and up and down.

Bad wheel bearing?

The wheel falls off.

change the axle while in the air shake the wheel and look. If the boots ripped the axle needs to be replaced/rebuilt especially if youve been driving on it. You know the axle is busted so fix that first if its binding it can do what your saying.

Just go outside and start yanking on the tires to hear any clicking or feel any movement. If you cant, then jack it up and do the same thing with each wheel off the ground.

Sounds like your wheel bearing has shit the bed.

When the axle gets too dry, it will let you know my snapping most likely.

I just yanked on them, and it did seem that the L/R had a little slack, but it could be my imagination

Jack the car up in the front and see if there is excessive play by trying to wiggle the tire left right up and down if there is play then the bearing is bad

Sounds like a bad cv joint from what you described. The 4 cylinder toyota camrys have the same issue with their cv joints, usually the inner that goes bad causing the issue but under throttle it would basicly feel like the car is bouncing up and down in the front/shaking violently.

When you would let off, it stops or just very light crusing throttle but as soon as you would put torque to the joints shake shake shake.

Wheel bearings tend to make noise when they go bad or have a vibration/shake all the time whether your coasting or accelerating.

So i doubt its a bad wheel bearing.

Yeah, have not heard any noises at all to this point in regards to the wheel bearing. I think it may be the axle

I went out and yanked and yanked again but I still felt nothing unusual.

Yep, gonna be the axle. The symptoms match a bad axle. Its rare on our cars but it does happen. Ive seen axles ran completely dry of grease for years and all they end up getting is the clicking when turning but as far as normal driveability and feel, you would never know it was bad.

The clicking is usually a sign of the inner cv joint bad.
The shaking/jumping when accelerating is usually a bad inner CV joint.