my car has been making a pretty bad noise from the front passenger lately. when the car is cold and just inching forward you can hear something grinding. i instantly expect it to be bearings so i jack it up. the tire moves side to side alot and no up and down so i think its just tie rod ends. after a long time of changing those out (they were a complete bitch in the ***. i anti seized the **** outta them this time) i try to align the car and got it going pretty straight but the damn thing still makes horrible grinding noises. its like you can hear the bearings rolling around inside. Its almost like theyre making a noise of scraping against sand or something. the noise gets quieter but will still hum quite a bit as im rolling along. the tire is no solid when i jack it up with no play whatsoever but the noise persists. my questions is whether a bearing can be bad and not have movement or maybe its the cv shaft or half shaft or whatever you wanna call it. ill be outta town this weekend for the holiday (deer hunting in minnesota is more important than christmas) so i wont have time to figure it out till next week

 

Check your noise dampener "skid plate" it could have fell down or your bracket could have bent, I tend to bend mine every time i go drifting down a dirt road.

 

Well I do live on a dirt road however I removed the skid plate long ago. Too much snow got stuck up there. It wasn't doing much good

 

Pull the caliper and see if you have crap stuck behind the brake pads - I assume you checked the pads already for thickness. You could have a shot CV joint as well. How do the inner and outer boots look?

 

Yep checked pads. Boots on the shaft are good but the rack boot is bad. Again I assume its the bearing just from the type of noise but the tire is solid when jacked up. How do I know if the shaft is bad?