Help identifying noise

[Lionel Hutz]

This is going to be a tough one to describe until I can get a video clip when it happens.

I did a full day of wheeling around the Alpine Loop and probably 4-5 hours into the day I started hearing an intermittent sound like the power steering pump working. Each time the sound only lasts a second and there’s no correlation between 2H, 4H, 4L, locked/unlocked, automatic or manual shift, or the current gear. If it was the power steering pump I would think that I’d hear it more often and regularly.

I was driving this morning through the mountains and also heard it intermittently in normal 2H paved road driving. The beat way I can describe is just a quick whir and then it’s gone until it randomly happens again.

All fluid levels look good, nothing overheated on the trip, I was aired down on the trails, but aired back up for today’s driving. Other than the sound everything drives and feels just fine.

Any thoughts on where to start looking? I’ll have a second set of ears in a day or two or help diagnose and hopefully get a video clip.

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[m3reno]

If you are parked with the Jeep idling and windows down, don't touch the steering wheel, it should be quiet, then turn the steering wheel. Do you here that noise after you turn the wheel?

 

[Lionel Hutz]

If you are parked with the Jeep idling and windows down, don't touch the steering wheel, it should be quiet, then turn the steering wheel. Do you here that noise after you turn the wheel?

Nope, no noise turning the wheel.
I was parked, idling, and turned the wheel to full lock each way 4-5 times and no noise.

I can be driving or idle and hear it. It’s all of a second, if that, and just barely loud enough to hear with the window down.

I describe it as a pump sound or whir only because it doesn’t sound like anything else. So far I’m unable to reproduce it at will.

 

[Lionel Hutz]

Got a clip of the sound

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