My 2005 saturn vue awd is making a growling and grinding noise from the frontend,its not the brakes or rotor what could it be?

Check you power steering fluid level.
The pump might be going'

are the brakes grinding? metal to metal anywhere? also check driveshafts..

does the screeching noise only happen when you put your foot on the brake-if so then you need to replace the brake pads-when you step on the brakes with a warped rotor you can feel the brakes pulsating-if you had a lower ball joint going bad it would make a rusty hinge sound-you should check at a shop that does front end alignments they can tell you for sure if its a ball joint-I would have them replace both sides and get an alignment done-cheers Denny p s they could check your brake pads too-

I would suggest inpsecting the brakes. If there grinding when you step on the bedal they are worn out. Let me know if you have any questions and I'll do my best to answer them. Thank you for using FixYa.com!

I’m happy to assist further over the phone at https://www.6ya.com/expert/jeremy_d728a59f986299fa

thats AWD, is your vehicle normally front wheel drive, theres no easy way for the transfer case to jump into AWD, mine does it to although mines a Expedition an its the front that kicks in.....The only thing you can do is keep a eye on fluid inside axle....

i am a saturn tech and ive never heard of this concern,the columns do go bad but they just set a ses light and cut out power,the column could be bad,it could also be the intermediate shaft u joint binding,,,i rec take to dealer, could be serious

thee are shims that cme on the car new if these are not there it will click when brakes are applied

Have you checked your wheel bearings? When these go out you can get a harsh grinding noise. This sounds like that is what it might be. Does it happen when you are going fast/slow turning/going straight? I know you said it's inconsistent but the more info the better. However, if I had to bet, based on what you have already said, it's your wheel bearings. Let me know if you have further questions. Thanks for using FixYa!

more than likely you have warped brake rotors. or lack of parallelism in the rotors. you can get them machined if there is enough meat left on the rotor or just buy a new set which isn't all that bad for that vehicle since it's a floating rotor. good luck