\/ENOM

I have a '98 Honda Accord EX I4, and I am getting a lot of road noise at higher speeds. The faster I'm going the louder the road noise gets. Doesn't go away or change when I brake, so the only thing I can think of is the tires?

But its ONLY in the rear? Could the steel belts in the tires be worn out? The tires I'll admit are cheap from about a year ago I got them from Costco.

The car has 158K miles.

98CoupeV6

Ever replace your bearings? Mine went at 150-160k.

\/ENOM

Interesting, how much would it be to replace the front and rear wheel bearings?

Accord1278

I had the same problem on my '98 LX (4 cyl) sedan. I have aftermarket rims and tires that I use during the warm weather, but they have cheap tires on them, and as a result, I get a lot of noise on the highway, the faster I go, the more noise I get...usually it's not much of a problem under 30mph or so. The stock rims and tires that I throw on the car during the winter have good tires on them and get basically no noise at all, like a "normal" car. From my experience, it is was def. my tires. I have about 77k miles on my car and really haven't had a probelm with the bearings, but on my previous car, my bearings were bad and I was getting noise as a result of the bearings. But for starters, get rid of those cheap tires that you have on the car. They are not that expensive for stock sizes.

http://www.tirerack.com/tires/Compar..._965HR5KH16_=4

98CoupeV6

$80/each or so for each rear hub assembly. You can do it yourself if you have patience, a service manual and a torch and a helper to loosen the screws holding in the hubs.

Why are you replacing the fronts?

totalimmortal

My passenger front went first and just got replaced. Drives like a dream now.

e3NiNe

just like mr coupe said, check your wheel bearings and don't forget to change the spindle nuts while you're at it.

\/ENOM

I'm wondering if its just the tires, because they are in fact cheapo tires.

jschmid

I haven't had a wheel bearing go out in my Accord, but I drove a 325i for a month that had a wheel bearing going out and I could get the noise to get louder or quieter by turning left and right on a windy road going over 40mph or so. As the suspension load is decreased it gets quieter, etc.

Not sure if an Accord will give the same symptoms but maybe try that. If it's the tires it likely won't get louder/quieter.

98CoupeV6

I assumed mine was the tires until they started squealing because they were so bad. The pitch didn't really change during cornering, esp since they were both worn.