Signs of a bent rear beam?

[qwikredline]

gotta deal with real numbers. at 32 psi recommended, the centers will wear first, and your tires sound like they are just worn out and you have done ok.
wheel bearings in the balt, in fact all encapsulated bearings like this, can be shot and not show any "wiggle" movement when checked on the hoist. It appears to me your tires are done and you may need a bearing some place.
If I rotated tires as often as you I would shoot myself. Once a year does it for me. I do about 10-20 k miles a year (summer spring fall only). My star specs are now 3 /32 at the rear and 6/32 at the front after (you guessed it) annual rotation. I am on a slippery slope for tires, if I push it i will make it to TOTD2 with these tires and thats it. Or I will replace them en route to the tail. Or after. Whatever.

My centers are a little deeper than the edges lol. I run 30 psi. But more important, I run a 245 on a 9.5 inch rim. What size tire/wheel are you running?

I picked up a sheet metal screw in one rear tire, about an inch from the sidewall recently. Now its on the front after rotation. Its plugged from the inside, but I know there is damage to the belt, I can perceive a change in balance which is not consistent.

So trying to help you, I would take a close look at your tires. I would consider replacing them if I were you, with Direzza Z1 .Or the Continentals, looking darn good as far as i can see , and the Conti DWS extreme all season high performance tire may well do most things pretty good, which is unusual for an all season tire.

BTW as the Star Specs wear down they get more noisy. In fact, its a noisy darn tire. But it is glue on the track for a street tire.

[Ecocharge]

gotta deal with real numbers. at 32 psi recommended, the centers will wear first, and your tires sound like they are just worn out and you have done ok.
wheel bearings in the balt, in fact all encapsulated bearings like this, can be shot and not show any "wiggle" movement when checked on the hoist. It appears to me your tires are done and you may need a bearing some place.
If I rotated tires as often as you I would shoot myself. Once a year does it for me. I do about 10-20 k miles a year (summer spring fall only). My star specs are now 3 /32 at the rear and 6/32 at the front after (you guessed it) annual rotation. I am on a slippery slope for tires, if I push it i will make it to TOTD2 with these tires and thats it. Or I will replace them en route to the tail. Or after. Whatever.

My centers are a little deeper than the edges lol. I run 30 psi. But more important, I run a 245 on a 9.5 inch rim. What size tire/wheel are you running?

I picked up a sheet metal screw in one rear tire, about an inch from the sidewall recently. Now its on the front after rotation. Its plugged from the inside, but I know there is damage to the belt, I can perceive a change in balance which is not consistent.

So trying to help you, I would take a close look at your tires. I would consider replacing them if I were you, with Direzza Z1 .Or the Continentals, looking darn good as far as i can see , and the Conti DWS extreme all season high performance tire may well do most things pretty good, which is unusual for an all season tire.

BTW as the Star Specs wear down they get more noisy. In fact, its a noisy darn tire. But it is glue on the track for a street tire.

I haven't checked back in on this thread lately and missed your response. With the RLs do you reccomend running a little less PSI than the reccomended 32, or is it dependent on what kind of tire is being used?

My car doesn't get driven enough to see that many miles, so I only end up having to rotate them once a year using the every 5K to 6K miles I have been going by. I am running the stock 17x7s and 215/45/17



I did notice one thing that was odd, upon closer inspection of the tires. It is having some weird tread wear on ths inside of the tire, kind of hard to describe. It's wavy looking on the inside treads, and you can feel it when running your hand across the circumference of the tire. I am sure that this is a probably a big part of the noise I have been hearing and the rumbling feeling.

I did get some new tires, but just haven't got around to having them put on yet and kind wanted to wait and figure this out first. From what I have read the waving on the rear tire could be related to a bad shock, but when pressing down on the back the car it rebounds back up. Even though I don't really feel like it for testing purposes, I may just take the shocks out completely to test them. If bad, I guess it time to go with the FE5 stuff

[qwikredline]

I would say wheel bearings as a culprit, its unlikley a bent rear beam but you need to measure that. you can do it with this with fishing line and a tape measure... or a good alignment shop....I run 30 psi for ride on the street. bump them way up 36/45 for auto x track and measure from there. auto x its hard to figure hotpressures as the laps doent last long enough but the star specs do come in after two runs. race track running is easier to figure out. you want about 38 hot imho on the track you cant apply auto x tothis rule...

[Ecocharge]

I guess the thing to do next is just put the tires on and get it allinged and see how it feels. If it still has the rumbling to it, it'll be time to figure out the wheel bearing needing replaced.

You mentioned that the encapsulated bearings can be bad and not show and wiggle movement on the delta cars. I know it has to be one of them on the passenger side, but I don't want to take a guess to replace the wrong bearing and being unable to return the part. I have tried the wiggle test, spinning the wheels while up in the air looking for signifigant drag or vibration on the springs. Do you have any reccomendations that are a sure bet way of finding the bad wheel bearing?

[qwikredline]

hmm. go to ebay you can buy 4 x 100 bearings for 40 dollars?
buy one and move it side to side lol

[Josh@OTTP]

Take the car for a ride and on a straight road swerve left and right while going about 40mph. If the noise gets louder one way over the other it is a bad bearing. Bearings make the most noise when unloaded. So if you turn right and it gets loud you replace the right side. It is alot easier to find a bad front bearing than a rear and if you can't find out which one it is just go to your loacl auto parts store and buy a bearing and swap out the right side, if the noise is still there put the stock right bearing back on and replace the left with the new bearing.

[Ecocharge]

Take the car for a ride and on a straight road swerve left and right while going about 40mph. If the noise gets louder one way over the other it is a bad bearing. Bearings make the most noise when unloaded. So if you turn right and it gets loud you replace the right side. It is alot easier to find a bad front bearing than a rear and if you can't find out which one it is just go to your loacl auto parts store and buy a bearing and swap out the right side, if the noise is still there put the stock right bearing back on and replace the left with the new bearing.

I'll have to give this a try. I have pretty much isolated it to one of the bearings on the passenger side, so if I don't hear anything from the front its got to be the rear

[montecarloman]

Its very rare to have a bad rear bearing. The only one I have ever seen was on my old cavalier and that was because the last owner jumped the car and destroyed all the bearings. Also remember that there are two bearings in each assembly. Either one could be bad. If you end up replacing one and the noise is still there swap the one you took off back onto the car and road test again. If the noise is still there get another new hub.

I am on a slippery slope for tires, if I push it i will make it to TOTD2 with these tires and thats it. Or I will replace them en route to the tail. Or after. Whatever.

Btw Mr. Powell I seem to recall something about someone replacing your tires in route awhile ago. However depending on your route down, if your headed through Maryland and need a shop to install tires. I should be able to help. Just let me know.

[qwikredline]

Its very rare to have a bad rear bearing. The only one I have ever seen was on my old cavalier and that was because the last owner jumped the car and destroyed all the bearings. Also remember that there are two bearings in each assembly. Either one could be bad. If you end up replacing one and the noise is still there swap the one you took off back onto the car and road test again. If the noise is still there get another new hub.



Btw Mr. Powell I seem to recall something about someone replacing your tires in route awhile ago. However depending on your route down, if your headed through Maryland and need a shop to install tires. I should be able to help. Just let me know.

thanks where the heck is maryland ? lol.... we fly down I75 so that may not work. But I appreciate the offer. Also in racing the cheapo rear bearings really go away faaast. We went to grand am wheel bearings then switched to front bearings bolted and reworked the beam for the rear. Solstice bearings are good for LNF.

On the street should last a long time, but the age of these cars may be an issue , iirc Ecocharge has an 04 redline ? corrosion is deadly that winter thing. But then eco is in the left coast?

[montecarloman]

my mistake, I assumed it was his DD. I remember Venoms thread about converting the front hubs to the rear after he trashed his factory rear after one weekend.

I pm'ed you some details about the shop.

[Ecocharge]

On the street should last a long time, but the age of these cars may be an issue , iirc Ecocharge has an 04 redline ? corrosion is deadly that winter thing. But then eco is in the left coast?

For a non tracked and pampered car, it seems the bearings should last quite a while, but who knows. Mine is an 05. Don't worry, it stays tucked in the garage when that time of the year rolls around, even for it being in the southeast I am going to be putting it away for a while around this time next month.

I tried the test that Josh suggested going towards the left and right about 40, and there was no difference in noise from one side to the other. I am just going to get the new tires put on and get it alligned and go from there. Hopefully it's just crappy tires with funny wear causing all of the noise, and no need for extra parts