ethrelke

I have a 2007 ES 350 that is making a humming / whining sound when driving. It is worst at 40-45MPH. Tires are new and car was aligned. There doesn't seem to be anything wrong with steering. I just had the 90K maintenance checkup. It appears to be coming from the front passenger side of the car. Idling, nothing is noticeable. There was no noise a week ago, but has progressively gotten worse in the last week. I don't notice any other odd driving behaviors.

ESh

I bet it's your wheel bearing

chuyrobles

^^^^ What he said ^^^^

I am about to replace same bearing this weekend. Wife ran over a curb hard enough to flatten the tire a few years ago. When I replaced wheel calipers a few weeks ago, I slowly spun the wheel in place and could feel it was not as smooth as the driver side. It's not humming, but the damage is going to be a little different than yours. The pitch might change as you round corners. It's also possible you have a bad brake caliper; you can rule that out by slowly braking at speed to see if the pitch changes. But, I'm suspecting the wheel bearing also.

Blue Moose Engineering

I 3rd that...wheel bearing...especially if the vibration and noise are particularly bad at a certain speed range

ralphtc

I thought it was my wheel bearings as well, turns out for me it was my tires, I bought the car used, and it came with summer tires, which made that load humming noise, the tread was still good on the summer tires, but apparently they were bubbling, on the opposite side, so happy to have all season tires now ( went to townfair and got new tires)from experiencing summer tires, I don't know why anyone would want them. So nice to have a quiet smooth ride and quiet interior cabin again.

mlacomb

Another vote on tires. I know they're new, but that's a change - and wheel bearings won't typically only make a noise at specific speeds.

ralphtc

Exactly usually wheel bearings sound like a helicopter, it was such a relief to know it was just the tires, I love this car so much. I'm officially a Lexus man for life.