Wheel bearing or Diff noise?

[MrWampus]

I wrote in a post a while back (the one with my to-do list) That I had a whine starting and figured it to be the diff. Someone suggested maybe it was a wheel bearing instead. How can I tell? Since I wrote that post the noise has gotten louder and it now sounds like I have a heavy treaded mud tire on my car. The noise is loudest between 40-45mph. It doesn't go away at faster speeds, it just gets drowned out by all the other noises. The noise almost goes away completely when I go around a curve to the right and gets a little louder on a left curve. It's hard to tell whether it's coming from front or back, it's ubiquitous. Before it got louder I would have said it was coming from the back. Any ideas on how I can tell if it's a bearing and which end it is coming from? If you pressed me to guess which side I would say right side, but since the whine seems to be coming from everywhere I can't say for sure.

I'd like to catch this before it fails if possible. A broken diff gear killed my first 1979 spider (nearly killed anyway) and I don't want to go through that again if that's what it is.

Suggestions?

[124JOE]

jack up the front and wiggle the wheel "top and bottom"
to check it for loose "wobble" if its the front remove all and grease those berrings


in the rear jack it up"use stands"put it in neutal and pull spin it, give it a wiggle
check the other side also
hope this helps

[azruss]

definitely sounds like a wheel bearing. with no load on the wheel it can be hard to tell. the wiggle test is a good one if the bearing is bad enough. sometimes you can spin the wheel and hear it or feel it.

[Daniel]

don't rule out tires sometimes they can wear funny or have defects and make odd noises making you think its
a wheel bearing .

[MrWampus]

UPDATE: It was definitely a wheel bearing. Had both sets of front wheel bearings replaced today, noise gone. The mechanic said the right front was pretty bad. I probably waited longer than I should but wanted to be certain what the problem was. By the time I took it in today I was certain it was right front.