I don't have a clue whether these two components and the issue I am having are in any way connected but I thought somebody may be able to give me some insight.

My tc is wearing out wheel bearings really fast. In the last 70k miles I have AT LEAST replaced the front bearings twice each. I figured it was the quality of the bearings (Duralast cheepies but great warranty) and used the warranty once on each side. So im 4 bearings deep at this point and I decide to replace the bad one at the time with a Timken, best qualty outside of OEM I could find.

I'm not sure whether its the Timken side thats bad now or the Duralast but I believe I am getting noise from both sides. I won't know for sure until I replace the one that is the loudest.
On my way into work this morning while listening to what sounds like mud tires on my car I thought is there a possibility that the front sway bar is putting more stress on these bearings and causing them to wear quicker?
The roads I drive are pretty curvy and I used to drive more err...spirited? but after these issues I have been taking it easy and still having the same old issues.

The place I have the bearings pressed at has done bearing work for me for years and has since done bearing work for me on other vehicles with no issue so I'm not concerned about it not being pressed properly. They also mentioned the carrier looked to be in good shape and they didn't think it an issue.

I thought that possibly the Front sway bar I have (Megan Racing) could be putting more stress on the bearings and not letting the car naturally "roll" like it would without the sway bar.

Any thoughts from this long winded question?

 

I don’t have experience with front bearings, my oem are still going strong at 90k. I replaced a rear hub assembly with duralast and the bearing only made it 3 months. Changed to moog and it has been good for 20k (still going). Have you considered buying oem front bearings from Toyota?

EDIT: I don't think the sway bar would be the reason for chewing up bearings or the shop as you mentioned. I'm not 100% sure but in all the research I have done on front sway bars I haven't found many relevant issues to the bearing.

 

At the time I didn't have the money for OEM so I just did the cheap stuff in hopes it would be ok. After that they had free replacement so I tried them again and as soon as I did one the other went out. I'm going to do the Timken one more time since they are under warranty and I'm not positive it's even the Timken side has gone bad. If it's bad again I'll get me a set of OEM.
I did however just take the strut bar off and the bearing noise is still there but significantly quieter. I've had the bar on there for over 130k so I'm going to have to relearn to drive it hahaha

 

Well that's weird that the strut bar had any influence on the noise from your bearings... I wouldn't be alarmed, just saying its weird in my opinion, and now I'm curious to hear what you find.

Has your car ever been wrecked? Keep us posted.

 

When the car was new it had some cosmetic damage and they had to do some work on the drivers quarter. It was done through toyota motor co. so I'd say it was done before it had made it to the original owners hands. I bought the car with about 24k on it and I've never had an accident in it. I had one bearing replaced today and sure enough the other was bad also. So tomorrow there doing the other side. I'll post the mechanics comments on everything tomorrow after I pick it up.

 

Mechanic said everything looked great, bearings were just bad. Drove the car about a week and everything is going good, quiet, no problems. I'm going to let it ride w/o the strut bar and see if it makes any difference....