"New" Excursion and New Noises
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"New" Excursion and New Noises
Just bought a 2001 Excursion V10 4x4 4.30 ex municipal vehicle. I've only had it a few days, and today it started making a low hum/drone noise started happening around 50mph, but now will do it as low as 20mph as well. One thing I found that will stop it is engaging 4 low. That starts a whole other noise - a metal clanging sound from the front hubs. That's with the hubs set to "auto". Setting them to "lock" brings on that clanging sound all the time. Not sure what happens with the humming sound as I haven't tested that yet. Any ideas on what is causing these noises? I like the truck and hope to keep it awhile as it's only got 159,000 miles on it.
Thanks in advance!
Art
Thanks in advance!
Art
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I haven't exactly located the source of the noise - When I get a minute today, I'm going to take it back out and see if I can reproduce it. Do you think it's the whole bearing assembly since the noise goes away when engaging 4wd? Or just the locking hub?
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I did some testing this afternoon. I can reproduce the noise with the hubs set to "auto" and transfer case in 4x2. As soon as I move the switch to 4x4, the noise goes away followed by the metallic clanging from the front end. Presumably the hubs. If I set the hubs to "lock" and the transfer case in 4x2, the noise isn't there, but there is some temporary metallic clanging from the front end that seems to go away. From the little snow I could find today, 4x4 does not work in auto, but it does when the hubs are set to "lock". Do you think replacing the OEM hubs with a set of Warn or MileMarker manual ones ought to take care of the issue?
Fleet Mechanic
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Could be the hubs, but first order of business would be to jack up each side and see if the wheel moves at all. Any movement points to the unit bearing itself. Second thing I’d do is check the u-joint at each wheel. You should be able to spin the shaft by hand with the wheel turned (in 2wd). If not, the joint may be frozen. If all that is good, I’d start checking into the hubs themselves along with dropping the front diff grease and checking inside for play in the gears, metal shavings/ chunks, etc.
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