Car wheels

my car wheels make a clacking noise like a stick in a bike wheel and get faster the quicker i drive…its driving me mad what is it grrr my car is a vauxhall astra

Probably a CV joint, especially of the sound changes when you turn. It’s impossible to tell without getting it up on a lift.

Unless there is actually something caught in the path of the wheels, the wheels themselves do not make noise. This noise is likely to be a failing CV joint in one or both of the front axles. When they get to the point of constant clicking, failure is imminent.

If you don’t want to be stranded in the middle of nowhere at an inconvenient time, I suggest that you take the car to a competent mechanic a.s.a.p. There is a possibility that the problem could be something other than a failing CV joint, but none of the other possibilities are any more optimistic than the CV joint scenario, so I suggest that you have the car examined and repaired right away.

As usual, we seem to be in synch with each other, MB.

thats kind of what i thought thank you everyone. time to put hand in pocket i suppose, why cant cars be simple and cheap!

They were once. My '61 Beetle was. Of course, it had terrible brakes, terrible handling, almost no heat, probably 40 HP on a good day, no creature comforts whatsoever, and would have crumpled like a plastic cup if anyone had hit me. Oh, and it needed heaps upon heaps of TLC just to keep running.

Cars to day are way, way, way, way more durable and reliable than the old simple and cheap cars I grew up with. And far safer and more comfortable too.

Does your Astra have plastic wheel covers? My wife’s 98 Ford Windstar (minivan) was making a similar noise. I was thinking CV joints also, it turned out to be the wheel covers. Take the covers off the wheels and see if the clicking goes away.

Ed B.

true but i remember my dad fixing his own cars now days it seems like one problem runs off another and costs a fortune…although i do agree they are alot more safer and comfortable

While you have the wheel covers off check for loose lug nuts.

Cars are definitely getting more complex. And every year it’s something new, some new way of using the brakes to try to make an SUV handle like a supercar. Or some new untra-high-sensitive EVAP system monitoring sensor (actually just an absolute pressure sensor in the gas tank that monitors vacuum). All this new gobbledygook seems to present more opportunities for problems. Some of these new ideas are driven by the feds constantly “turning the screws” to save the earth, and IMHO some are driven by marketing divisions looking for a “edge” for their products. The BMW I-drive, perhaps the dumbest idea since base jumping, came from the latter.

Another problem is that most average folks could easily understand most of the way cars of old worked. Much of it was obvious. People have difficulty inderstanding the way todays car meter fuel and control spark…and now even control valve timing. Much of it isn’t visually obvious. And then there’s the EVAP system, an overly sensitive system that prevents a single molecule of gas from ever escaping into the air lest our oceans flood our plains.

Sorry, my philosophies cramped my answers.