Well, a few days ago a semi ran me off the road, the roads were not plowed and somehow he couldn't keep control of his truck. I went off into a drainage ditch, the ground looked smooth so I figured I would just go through it... but what I dident see was there was a curb there, and the ground was lower infront of the curb basically making the curb be about 12 inches off the ground, and is straigt up. well I hit this going about 25-30 mph. It obviously hit really hard and when I hit all I could picture was the control arms just bent and the front end destroyed. Turns out everything seems to be fine, drives perfect, doesn't pull wheels still in balance (dick cepek rims are obviously incredibly strong) but I have this noise that comes and goes when it wants but ONLY in 4wd. it is coming from the side that hit the curb (passenger) and sounds like something rubbing on sheet metal and kind of resonating making it louder. Also there is a metal to metal type squeek that I hear that is not related to bumps on the road... all of the noises stop when the truck is in 2wd, or when I lock the brakes.

I inspected everything pretty close today, and all looks fine except for the passenger side sway bar connection where it hooks to the little rod, its slightly bent but i wouldn't think it would cause this problem.

I made sure that those little sheet metal things by the brake rotor are not rubbing. I checked the front diff fluid, along with transfer case fluid and all are topped off.

The u joint appears to be fine and tight, along with the front drive shaft.

I am out of ideas.

The noise that it makes is completely intermittent there is times it will go for miles with out making the noise, and I have never herd this before this incident.

Obviously it would be hard to diagnose with out seeing it or hearing it but im just looking for some possible ideas.
I have driven the truck in 4wd all weekend with it doing this, and I can tell this noise isnt anything serious its just a noise that is annoying.

any help would be great.

 

Have you tried popping off your tire and spinning the bearing to see if its "grinding" or "catching"? You might have tweaked your hub and thats whats causing the noise. Sounds like you looked it over pretty well though. Thats the first thing that comes to mind.

 

That will be my next check, but the reason I doubt its the hub is that it only does it in 4wd... Still worth a check for sure, I will do it today.

after that I guess I get to pull the axle and see if that leads to anything.

 

The only reason i say that is because mine would never make a noise until i put it into 4 either. The hub was shot. Just wondering if ya didnt tweak something in there hitting that hard. Good luck and keep us posted on what ya find out.

 

Really... That may be it then... Kinda does sound like bearing noise.

Even if it is I think I got EXTREMELY lucky... I have never hit anything this hard, I really expected this to cost 2000 plus to fix this by how hard I hit... lol

 

Yea i would start with the bearing and work my way into the drive shaft. Sounds like ya got lucky than. Good luck

 

off topic here but...... i love those rims. i see them in my near future.tax time is fast approaching.lol

 

Any time my mother complained about the car making some kind of strange noise, she'd insist my father drive it since he was the engineer/mechanic. Naturally, he never heard a thing.

Sometimes, she'd get fed up with it and she'd make him drive that car in question when we were all going someplace. It turns out that he'd always turn the radio volume up and as such didn't hear anything.

Try that and get back to us. It seemed to work for my dad.

 

Yeah, that is a sweet looking truck. I am interested to see what this is...only happening in 4WD makes it odd.

 

I just had an issue with one of my axle ujoints. It was fine in 2 wheel but was clicking and grinding in 4 wheel. I bet thats it. Still could be bearing,but one would think that would do it in 2 wheel also.