My RX 330 (05yr) has a grinding noice coming from the front. The faster you go the louder it becomes. The brakes were replace about a month ago, I had the problem before the brakes were replaced. Has anyone had this problem.
Thanks
Bob L

 

can you tell if it's coming from the wheels/suspension or the engine? there is a thead about 8 or 10 below this about a bearing issue. that was rear not front but wonder if it's similar noise to what you are hearing.

 

thanks for your response Greg, it sounds like the front end. The vechile is in Canada in a area in which we don't have a Lexus dealer within 200 miles, I have been using the local Toyota dealer and with not much sucess. I going to ask the guys at Toyota to try it one more time if I can't pin point it my wife will drive the RX back to Wash DC where I purchased it for a look.

 

yikes. good luck. let us know how it turns out. force be with you.

 

they have to have a Lexus dealer before Wash DC from were you are or call the 800 Lexus number and ask them were to take it to get it fix

 

Since there's not much info on the problem, could you have the toyota guys look at the ball bearing? Someone in this forum has it going out within 10k miles.

 

The noise source seems to be related to the wheel rotation. So start with simple stuff related to the wheel and work your way to the transmission.

Although going to Lexus/Toyota dealership/shop would be desirable, but typically it can be diagnosed by any competent mechanic. You may run into warranty repair work reimbursement issue, but I hope Lexus will work with you. So do check with them.

Once you can demonstrate the problem to the mechanic, (s)he can jack up the front and do quite a bit of checking. If the source is the transmission, then I would try the Lexus/Toyota repair shop. [my understanding is that the transaxle work is done in shop, but for transmission the Lexus/Toyota is a middle man.]

Salim

 

Might want to if possible have an external observer watch as the vehicle goes by on a side street or elsewhere to pinpoint noise. Sometimes (and I know this all to well from my RX300) that a noise will appear to be somewhere when actually it is only the reverberation of the sound from the road.

 

that's good advice. the acoustics in the RX cabin can be tricky. it may not be where you think it is. having someone ride in various passenger seats or someone on the outside as Lexmex suggests is definitely worth a try

 

wheel bearings... should be noticeable when turning left or right to figure out which side. also, if you jack the car up and try to spin the wheel from which you suspect the noise is coming from you'd hear the noise. grab the wheel at the top and the bottom with both hands and rock the wheel (push/pull) on it, if the wheel moves that is the second indication that the wheel bearings are going or gone. Definitely is not safe to drive with bad bearings. I heard of horror stories of people losing their wheels driving on the highway...