Wheel bearing noise…not wheel bearing though

Maybe it's actually the other side stuff is hard to hear in front ends and all that seriously. I know mechanics get the left and the right messed up when listening to wheel bearings and all that there's not really a lot in the front end of a Prius rotating around or reciprocating to make all this noise to be honest about it or I can't see it similar with my generation too both the front ends of both of these cars are very similar from drive axles to hubs and all of it so in your front end other than your axle your wheel bearing assembly and the carrier bearing that's the bearing you tap the axle into when you're installing a new one in your transmission and funny thing I just watched a video where Sherwood down at royalty Auto replaced a needle bearing with a sleeve and a Tacoma truck in the transmission where the front drive axle smacks into the transmission that is a kit that fits a whole lot of Toyotas I don't know if the Prius is included or if there's a similar fix I haven't heard of this problem on the Prius doesn't mean it doesn't exist but this had to do with where the axle went into the transmission with his chassis microphone setup he was able to clip that to the front end of the car and one or two places and that's how he discovered the problem He had one of his mic sensors sitting right under the inboard CV joint on the left side driver side and you can see the noise on the computer screen as the microphone picked it up when he put it in four-wheel drive or some other mode he put the truck in the noise would go away so it was when it was not in four-wheel drive I guess or maybe he locked the front wheels and the noise went away and unlocked when it was freewheeling It was noisy something along those line anyway there's a sleeve that's made to replace this needle bearing that's in this assembly I don't think we have the needle bearing or the sleeve but I haven't looked just a thought everybody's always talking about the wheel bearing but at the other end of the axle can be a lot of the racket where it goes into the transmission.

 

Rotate the wheels front to back to front.
Or swop the front wheels right to left to right.

Does the noise change? Bet it does.

 

Have you listened to the other 3 wheel bearings? Those things are ventriloquists, you would not be the first one to have replaced the wrong one.

 

Drive shaft CV joint?

(a quick skim of @Tombukt2 ’s tome: he mentioned as well)

 

I don't think the Prius has the same bearing type as the all-wheel drive light trucks maybe similar but I do know if there's play up there usually annoys will ensue never had a problem on it either of the Gen 3s the high mileage or the low mileage one with any of that I did replace the wheel bearings on the high mileage and put brake pads and new rotors but never really had any noise even the car that had 396,000 when it got parked with original wheel bearings and all the front end stuff original except the brake pads no noise dead quiet car other than plastic flapping that was coming undone on the body and chassis.

 

Often the sound seems to come from the opposite side. I change both sides for that reason. Once the bad bearing is out it is easy to tell.