Noises coming from front drivers side...

[blizz]

One is a knocking sound when going over bumps. I was thinking the half shaft is toast but don't know for sure. The other is kinda like a raspy shht shht shht noise when I start moving that gets faster the faster I go then eventually goes away once I really get going. I was thinking that was the bearings. Any ideas guys and how to check for what these might be? My 96 has 97k miles and I'm thinking of dropping some $ to bring it back including the spider conversion. It's missing a lot and just generally feels like it lacks power.

 

[laredo1307]

Knocking sound could be a ball joint or loose/broken shock mount. To check you ball joints jack up the front so the tire is off the ground (one side at a time), put a hand on the top of the tire and a hand out the bottom, and push back and forth to see if you can make the whole wheel wiggle. If they wiggle then your ball joints are probably shot.

For the other sound I would take off the wheel and see if anything is stuck between the brake rotor and dust shield. Also, turn the wheel hub and see if you can hear the sound. If it's the bearing you will have to replace the whole wheel hub assembly. It's pretty simple though. I believe it's a 26mm socket to remove the wheel hub center nut and a 15mm socket to remove the 3 bolts attaching the wheel hub. I definitely recommend going OEM on this even though they are quite a bit more.

While you've go the wheel off it should be easy to inspect the shock mounts.

 

[SunlitComet]

for the knocking also check sway bar mounts and t-bar "dog bone" isolator mounts.at each end of the mounting crossmember.

 

[Y2KpewterZ]

Other noise sounds like u joints in front drive shaft.