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I have a 2004 Ford Focus. I noticed and smelled smoke coming up from passenger side tire area. I took look at the brake caliper and the piston goes in fairly easily with a C-clamp. The brake pads look alright. I couldn’t visually tell if there was uneven pad wear. I did measure and there was a 0.03″ difference. Probably nothing to worry about. If I stick my nose very close to the wheel hub I can barely smell the same burning smell from when I was driving.
I took pry par and put it in between the wheel studs. I placed one finger at the very end of the handle and then turned the hub forwards. I did this to both sides and noticed that the passenger side was slightly harder to turn. This is pointing me towards the bearing and not the brakes. I’m the original owner of the car, and I’ve never replaced the bearings. They might be showing their age.
Is it normal (i.e. not shade tree-ish) to replace the one bearing or should I replace both left and right bearings? Is there other things I should be checking to rule out bad bearings or bad brakes?
Any other ideas?
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Lift the car. Put your hands at 9 and 3; shake. Now put your hands at 12 and 6; shake. Do you feel any play?
If you feel equal amounts of play at both of the, afore, mentioned positions then it may be a bearing.
Most likely you are seeing and smelling smoke from the engine.
Is it a white smoke or a blue-ish smoke?If it was smoke from the brake or the bearing it would be significantly hotter, you would be able to feel an unusual amount of radiant heat without touching anything. And if it was the brake, you would smell it just being nearby.
About the bearing replacement…. You can probably assume they both went on at the same time, 11 years ago. If one is acting up, the other is probably not to far behind, unless there was some accident history. While it wouldn’t, in my opinion, be unsafe to change just one, it would be a good idea to just do both of them. Unless the other was recently replaced.
I saw white smoke. When I saw it, I pulled over and checked under the hood. I didn’t see anything there. When I did go over the tire, I definitely felt a significant amount of heat coming from it.
I didn’t feel any play in the bearings. I checked pads and they looked normal. I did see any heat cracks or crystallization on the pads.
Sounds like it was coolant coming out of the reservoir/expansion chamber.
If it were the brakes you would have noticed a very strong smell of burning brakes.
Check your coolant level.It is absolutely unnecessary to do all the bearings. It will not save money or time and it is very rare that a bearing would smoke. I’ve only seen a bearing smoke once, and that was on an over loaded trailer. So there is zero reason to think that the other bearings would ever do this.
Saying to change all the bearings is horrible advice.
We have zero evidence that the smoke came from the bearing. A bearing in that condition would make a lot of noise. If it was white smoke, it was probably evaporating coolant.
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