In the last few months while driving st above about 40mph it sounds like I have a turbine engine in the back of my car. At first I thought it was abnormal road noise because my tires were worn. Yesterday I got new tires and the noise is still there. It's a loud low pitched whirring kind of like an onboard on a boat. Any ideas? One of the guys says it could be a bearing, but I've never had that happen to me before so I don't know where to begin in diagnosing let alone fixing that. By the way the car has 70,000 miles if it is a bearing is that normal for the mileage, I had a prelude that I ran into the ground with 250,000 miles before my sister totalled it and never had this problem. Thanks

 

A pothole can make a bearing go after a few thousand on it, soo.....

It does sorta sound like a bearing due to its very precise area of noise.

 

It's the wheel bearing. Happened to me as well.

 

Does it get worse/louder when slalom-style turning? (find an empty parking lot and have fun!).

If it gets worse when turning left in the slalom, its the right-side bearing. Oppsosite holds true for the left bearing.

 

How do fix it?

 

Yup,

Wheel bearing. Both of my rear bearings went @ 53K miles. Acura covered the parts and I paid $345 labor plus $100 diagnostic fee. That was a fun experience. Not to hijack the thread but this car has had more crap go wrong with it than any other car I have had. If you are out of warranty, you can buy the parts for $150 a set and do it yourself. It does not seem like it is a difficult job. They are sealed units so you do not have to pack them. Good Luck

 

Fix is easy: replace bearing unit on affected side(s).

Labour shouldn't be hard at all, especially if you have access to an impact driver, IIRC.

TSeXer: You got ripped off on the labour - $345 for two rear bearings? That's 4 hours of shop time... WAY too high for that job, IMO.

 

as mentioned severe pot hole or a bad batch of bearings (hope not) could get this started.

Get it fixed right away. Wheel can fall right off and it is very dangerous. You could die.

 

I totally agree. I've done them before on other cars (at like 120K miles). It is a 2 hour job. They wanted $500 at first for the labor. I called Acura Customer Service and they agreed to pay for the parts and got me "discounted labor". The way I figure, it was going to cost me around $300 for the parts and then my time to do the job. At the end of the day, wheel bearing should not go at 53K miles. I am not too happy with the whole situation.