I dont believe the rocking method is any good anymore..the older cars had alot of spring coils count that allowed more flexing..newer cars have lessened the coil count and went with better metals that hold resistance better( means lighter weight..remember when coils weighed 20 lbs? ) so they dont resonate unless you get a whole lot of weight transfering going on..so worn shocks will feel fine...until you drive down the road and the rear end lifts as you go over small humps or the front end wallows in the corners,,theres your signs. My stockers felt just fine sitting still but I knew otherwise...a shock strut change will verify this and youll have one of those well hell moments. My front struts had no pressure left in them, and were not leaking oil....really soft..53k miles

 

I can almost say with certainty that your front hub assemblies are shot. You cannot measure runout on a hub assembly with it on the car, by the time runout showed up where you could measure it on the car it would be way too loose. If you are still on the original hubs at your mileage, replacing them is a good idea anyway. It is an easy job and should make your rotor pulsation go away for good.

 

If the shocks are bad, it should be easy to see the leak, as they are sealed. look for an accumulation gunk.

 

from what I remember reading the service manual im pretty sure the procedure for measuring runout is done on the car.

 

Well, I have looked on line at a lot of auto parts places and eBay.

The front wheel bearings range from something like $30.00 to $369.95 depending on where you look.

Being frugal as the day is long and having just invested a tad over $120.00 in brakes I'm wondering just how much different the quality of the less expensive bearing would be when compared to say Timken brand.

I have been told that even Timken bearings are being made in the pacific rim these days.

Also why are the bearings with the ABS sensor generally less expensive.

My HHR does not have ABS breaks so I really do not need the sensors. It seems to me that non ABS equipped bearings should fit and work fine on a vehicle that does not have that feature,... right?

If the bearings do not cure my problem I will consider the struts to be bad. The ones on the buggy look for all the world to me like new ones. When I get back home I will ask the wrench who did the work on the car when it was traded in to see if they put new ones on it or not.

The struts on the car do not show any signs of leaking now or in the recent past. {like since we bought the thing}

 

If you buy Timken hub units, you are getting the OEM KBI hub assembly, same as the car was built with, made in Sandusky,Ohio. The ABS hubs are cheaper because there are more cars with ABS than not and supply/demand and increased production volume bring the cost down. Believe me, there is a huge difference with a company like Timken making an part in China and a generic company manufacturing parts and then selling them to importers. The big companies factories in china are state of the art, probably better than most of thier other facilities in the world and are being headed by people from all over the world. Yes, the regular line worker is Chinese and that is where you get the labor savings obviously but everything done there is world class. Generic companies I know for a fact some in China were making bearing on WWII era machines and there is very little engineering or quality testing going on with them.

 

I, on the other hand say; 6 at $30 = 1 at $180., harrumph. So, if the cheap ones go bad, you spend an hour under the car and another $30. Bearings are generally not a safety issue. That said, I did have some problems with "no name" rear wheel hubs 2 of 3 bad out of the box, but I found a better ("GMB") branded for $4 more. Try on ebay.

 

I concur with the explanation that barfan provided. I'd like to offer one other thought.

SOMETIMES, in China, like products come from the same manufacturing plant. One could be great quality and one not so good. A partial reason for this is, the way the quality is controlled. When, an American company like Timken (for example) does business with a Chinese plant they have essentially 2 quality control processes. One is a person(s) that is contracted from an outside company that measure and watches over your product. This person has responsibility to you, but also has responsibility to many other "outside" companies and many many other locations. Therefore the quality control MAY NOT be the best in the world (and do not forget this is China and a form of gratuity is an accepted practice). However, in addition, Timken may send over their own quality control team. This assures, in my estimation, a higher level of quality, if the manufacturing agreement allows the Timkin people to stop production, when observing a problem, and/or provide "engineering encouragement" to correct the problem.

This had been my experience, for GM, with China. But it did take a great length of time for acceptable product. As far as I know, this is still the accepted method for a higher grade part.

 

Well a pair front wheel bearings with ABS sensors for Cobalt/HHR/G5/ION are on the way to the house in Illinois.

The pair are only $93.95 with free shipping. I've asked several folks who work as mechanics and they tell me the ones with the ABS sensors will fit and work just fine on a vehicle not equipped with the system just fine.

I suppose if the bearings on the car now actually are bad this is a fairly cheap way to find out for sure. If these new ones cure my problem I will know to plan on replacing them with a 'better' set fairly soon.

If there is no substantial difference I will have the 'original' bearings to replace these 'cheap' ones.

When I replaced the rear ones on my '04 Neon, Auto Zone simply did not have replacement bearings with out the ABS sensors on them so I was forced to use the ones with the wire sticking out.

That was around 20,000 miles ago for that car and they are indeed running true and quiet yet.

As far as the struts on the HHR,... they seem to be Koni brand struts so they probably were replacement parts not so long ago. I still don't know any way to really test them except to look at them for obvious signs of leaking. I suppose if I were home I could take them off and see if they still have any gas charge in them or not but I don't want to get into that kind of wrench work this far from home.