Well, I fixed my bearing tonight!
 

Easiest fix evar: just realize the noise is coming from the rear brake pad wear sensor. :lol:

I'm a tool for not checking the brake pads 1st. But in my defense: a) I didn't even know there was a wear sensor noise maker thingy on the rear pads, and b) I forgot the last time I did the brakes, I only did the fronts... I guess those rears wear out about 1.5 times as fast as the fronts and not 2 times as fast like I'd hoped.

So, this means that I don't have to spend an ass load of money on bearing parts (thank god I didn't order $400 worth of parts this morning!). It also means I'll wait on the longer wheel studs till the bearings actually do need replacing (I'm sure racing the car w/ +48 offset rims will eventually do it).

The only thing that sucks is the reason I even bothered to look at my car tonight was because I noticed my RR was flat on the drive home from work! I took it off the car and pumped it back up and went over the whole thing inch by square inch with a spray bottle and couldn't for the life of me find a puncture. :?: The only thing I can think of is that some punk saw my car in the IGT parking lot, and since I was still on my race tires that don't have stem caps, they decided to let some air out. Highly unlikely... but I honestly can't find a leak *at all*. I inflated the tire way up, and I'm leaving it over night to see if it bleeds off any air. Then I swapped the P1s back on.

While I was swapping the rims, I checked for any play in the bearings, and I can't get even the tinyest amount of deflection in the bearings. I also couldn't get the LR to make any noise when I turned it while the car was up in the air. Later while torquing the lugs, I heard it squeal as the car rolled like 1 inch forward. I thought "no way that's a bearing, the car's barely moving!" so I went back there and pushed on the brake caliper to move it away from the rotor, and rolled the car and the noise was gone. So I'm pretty confident, all I need to do before Buttonwillow is get some new pads on there. Perhaps I'll take Dean's recommendation and go for some EBCs or something... Oh and I may need to get one new Azenis, and have it shaved to match the other 3, it that tire's leaking. I'm definately not going to patch a race tire that I plan on driving at 100+ mph on!

Now you can get R compounds instead. :twisted:

Not in STX. :(

wait.. that's a good thing... means less wear on the car and less money to spend on tires.

Did you check the stem for leaks? The valve in the end may be loose.

If it is a clean small nail/needle puncture in the tread that has not damaged the cord, a vulcanized patch from inside should be fine, even at speed.

Plugs are not great, and definitely make them a street only tire as they do damage the cord structure.

And yes, those little noise makers do their job. They got your attention didn't they?

Soooo? I guess that means I don't get your lugnuts now? I'm gonna take them anyway , when you're not looking. :twisted:

Well... eventually my bearings will go out for real... :lol:

I checked the valve stem by listening to it and couldn't hear anything.

BTW: this morning I checked the pressure and it was down 3psi. However it was also much colder in my garage (~30deg as opposed to the ~60deg in there when I took the last pressure measurement). So I'm not yet convinced there's really a problem. It really could have been someone just letting air outta my tire! :x The next step is to fill the bathtub up and get it underwater.

Take it up to 50 PSI and drop it in the tub...

Clean the brake dust while you are there :lol:

You should have checked that a while ago but good thing you found it. :lol: