I've got a 2005 Dakota 2wd with a growling noise I'm trying to troubleshoot. 60k miles. The noise starts at about 25 mph, and doesn't seem to vary much with speed. Seems to be coming from the fron but it's hard to tell. I thought it might front wheel bearings, but I spun them by hand w/the tire on and didn't really hear anything out of the ordinary or feel any play. The tires are Generals w/decent tread. I thought about rotating them just to see if that changed the noise any. The Haynes manual seems to point to the rear axle bearings, but it's hard to imagine those going out so soon. Any troubleshooting help would be appreciated.

Mike

 

I will move this to the 3rd Generation Dakota sub-section.

 

Been down this road before. On mine, it was the right front wheel bearing. Felt fine spinning by hand, but you can't get it 26 mph with a load on it spinning by hand! When I removed the front right caliper and then the hub......yikes! The outer wheel bearing was brinneled really bad, and still had some grease on it. New bearing and race, cleaned out any mess, repacked the inner, reused the seal, as the parts house sold me the wrong one. FIXED!