Best deal on Axles I found was with http://www.autohausaz.com/

Just over $70 shipped for my '04 STI. Only twice the cost of 1 OE replacement boot!!! Easy choice and now I have the old one as a "track" spare.

Awesome, thanks for the link. I'm picky when it comes to axle boots though, were they the tough factory style or were they made from that cheap rubber that cracks in 10k miles? New or reman?

81.25 shipped, not bad Dean. The site doesn't say new or reman though...

New as far as I know, and rubber appears to be similar in quality, but would not swear by it. They have multiple "brand" choices and I went with the cheapest.

Rubber boots fail because they get heat cycled, contaminate by petroleum products or cut. My headers crisped mine up. Having had a factory boot in my hand, they are nothing special IMHO...

How can you tell a properly reman part from new?

Wow, that's some inexpensive stuff. They sell a radiator for my car for $173.xy, shipped. But yah, no brand names or indication if parts are new, used, or remanufactured?

Email them and ask. They answered a question of mine very quickly. And reman on axles and such are fine IMHO. The CVS and boots are replaced and other components checked to meet factory specs. Actually, they are brand names, just OEM, comercial, domestic, or SEMA brands, not JDM/Reseller brands.

A NAPA axle is likely OEM from those brands.

The guys at NAPA told me that halfshafts are almost always new, somehow it just got really cheap to make them a few years ago.

I had the option of remanufactured or new when I bought mine from NAPA. IIRC, it was like $70 for remanufactured and $110 for new. I went for new. Wagon axles tend to be a touch less expensive though.

So Cory's thinking it is the pass. side bearing. Are those a do it yourself job or do you need a press? (05 STi for reference since my vehicle does not reflect)

Cory, what kind of beer do you drink??

You can do it yourself if you have a press.

Yeah, you need a press to get the new one in. And usually an air hammer to get the inner bearing race off.

NEWCASTLE! :D

sounds like a Half shaft to me as well. I've gone through a half shaft on each side, and wheel bearings, and end links on my L. You feel the half shafts worse than wheel bearing in my experiences . that rumble strip feeling probably = CV. if you disconnect the strut and try to swing the knuckle out a lil bit. the CV joint may just fall apart. often the Clip that holds all that stuff together falls out and then everything has too much play.

I have some spare half shafts if you want to try my dumb test, you'll need one on hand... :lol: (and if you want to keep it just bring me an other pick and pull one) :) but napa should have one for $50 with core charge really your best bargain!

When I swapped out the left knuckle I inspected the cv and didn't find anything that I thought would cause the noise. I'll have to pull apart the right side this weekend and see if there is anything odd on that side. The noise does change depending on which way you are turning as I put in my first post, maybe I'm just looking at the wrong side. I hope the cv just falls apart on the left side so it will be easy. I don't have a press so I couldn't do the bearing on my own. I do have an air hammer though.

Newcastle it is, that's one of my top picks too. Thanks again for looking at it for me.

So I am gonig to just order a cv and start there. Going against Cory's inclination that it's the right wheel bearing as it seems a whole lot easier and cheaper to do the cv. At least I'll have an extra if that's not it. I'm sure one will wear out.
I can't find anyone in town with one, I wanted to buy local for ease of warranty/exchange Napa only listed up to an 04. Just going to order from Dean's autohausaz.
Thanks for the input everyone, I'll post up again once I get it in.

CV Joints aren't commonly available by themselves. Nowadays, you just buy the whole axle.

Are 04 and 05 sti axles the same?? Napa has ones for the 04....
And I was just going to buy the whole thing, I should refer to it as a cv halfshaft I guess.

Nope. There are some minor differences with the ABS tone-wheel location. Plus there are some stub-axle spline differences between early '04 and late '04/'05 axles as well IIRC.

I am pretty sure they changed with the bolt pattern/bearing/spindle change. 5x100 axle is not the same as the 5x114...

Great thanks. I thought they were different too, but was hoping for confirmation. I won't be ordering from autohausaz either then, because they have 04 and 05 listed as the same part #.
They don't list one for an 06 which theoretically should be the same as the 05, they must have just goofed.

Call or email them and ask when/if there was a change. I am thinking there was a change when they changed hubs, but may be wrong. If you did the hub swap, did you have to swap axles, or not?

The guy I got the hubs from gave me the axles too. I'm sure they were different than the 02s I pulled out. There was a male shaft coming out of the tranny and a roll pin holding the axle in place in MY02, currently the tranny has a female end and the axle is held in by a clip on the end of it.

Just got off the phone with Lithia Parts and they have different part #s listed. They can only get reman'd axles up to 04. Should I take the gamble and order one for an 05 online and hope it fits?

They swapped the location of the ABS tone wheel when they swapped hubs. The '04->'05 conversion kits include an offset bushing that moves the tone wheel outboard on the '04 axles to match the '05 hubs.

But there was also a change to the splines on the front diff mid-year '04 IIRC. So early '04 axles won't work on a late '04 tranny and vise-versa. I'm not 100% sure about that, but I remember there being something along those lines... so '05 axles don't work on early '04s even with the hub conversion.

I'd call the guys in AZ. If you know what year the axles you have came from, tell them... I bet they can even count splines or measure stuff if you ask.

I wonder if we are confusing WRX and STIs. I thought all '04 STIs were the same and then everything changed in '05 with the hub conversion. I did not do anything special when I replaced my '04 axle. There was only one choice when I ordered, just different "brands".

I just looked on google and found '04 STI axles and then '05-'06 STI axles...

It does look like the WRX axle was the same '02-04. ????

I just remember all lots of people that were doing the '04->'05 hub conversions bitching about issues getting axles to make the ABS tone wheel line up. I didn't have that issue because I just use the adapter on my existing axles that I got w/ the '04 STi 6MT, so mine worked w/o the issues others seemed to have.