Chrysler Repair: Front End Crys.Sebring, shaft removal, wheel bearings

Question
When I am driving for about 2to 3 miles I get a strange grinding sound in the front end of the car I know what bad brakes sound like and this is not that sound at all.I was wondering do you think it could be the ball bearings or the ball joints and if so could you instruct on the replacement of the bearing or joints.The car is a Crystler Sebring 1999 2 door

Answer
Hi Charlie
I had some second thoughts about the noise you are getting. If it doesn't start right away but only after driving, and if you notice the sound is different when you are turning either left or right, then it may well be that you have a cv-joint that has a torn boot and is "dry" due to loss of lubrication grease. I would suggest that you get under the car, or jack it up, so you can examine the 2 rubber boots on each of the half-axle drive shafts (inner and outer) to see it the rubber is torn or you see grease thrown around on the chassis above where the boot would be spinning when the car is in motion. If so, then that rather than wheel bearings is the item that needs atttention. Often you can avoid the cost of replacing the half-shaft in its entirety by gettin a replacement boot which comes with additional grease and installing that in place of the torn boot. The conventional approach is to remove the half shaft and disassemble the joint so as to fit the new boot, though there is a short cut involving boots that you can install and then zipper up to avoid shaft removal. I can't vounch for the longevity of the latter. So do take a careful look to see that the boots are all of a piece, with no tearing or leakage, in which case it would be more doubtful that they would be making noise and so the original wheel bearing hypothesis would apply. The removal of the half shaft is similar to what I described for the bearing replacement. One trick, if you are going to remove the half shaft on the passenger side from the trans-axle housing which is in the center of the powertrain and drives the axles, is that you must remove the distance sensor from the top of the trans-axle housing so as not to damage its gear when you pull on the axle to remove it from the housing.
Roland