Excessive road noise question

[audinoobs4]

hello everyone. i was driving the other day on the highway and noticed that my car sounds like i have 35 inch truck tires on it. i thought my tire pressure was getting low but i checked it and it was fine. ever since then i have road noise after about 20mph and it sounds like it is only coming from the rear. also the car drives the same as before i heard the noise. its not that annoying but i still wanna know what it is. its still to cold here in chicago to rip everything apart in my driveway and look. My question is could this be a wheel bearing or something to do with the drive line?? Let me know what you guys think and tell me your experiences with this..
Thanks

[A4Dit]

Could be a wheel bearing, or if you're lowered it is due to uneven wear on the tires caused by negative camber.

[panix73]

More likely than not, it's your wheel bearings that are making noise. I just replaced mine, ~$60 or so for each bearing (1 per corner), and about another $25 or so for each bearing to be pressed on by your local shop. The bearing and press costs aren't too bad if you want to do this in your driveway, although the labor involved can be time consuming as you'll need to temporarily remove the entire spindle to bring it to someone who will be able to press the bearing. This involves temporarily removing/freeing your calipers, rotors, control arms, tie rods, freeing the spindle from your axle, and then removing each spindle from the car (one per corner). Then once you remove each spindle and have your new bearings pressed, you'll more likely than not, need and want an alignment after the install.

All in all, replacing your wheel bearings will quiet the road noise with increased speed. Although if you're not too mechanically inclined or like to wrench so much on your car, just drop it off at a shop and have it done. If you DO like to wrench on your own car, its a great time to replace/upgrade associated suspension parts while you're down there (i.e. tie rods, control arms) and while you're at it, do your brakes.