vortamock

Hey all, I hope everyone is having a great weekend. I could use a little input please.

The car makes a clunk noise when turning hard left and I am completely out of ideas. It will sometimes clunk turning right, but only if it first does it turning left. And even then, it isn't as prominent. When turning left, the clunk can be felt in the floor.

It isn't affected by brake or throttle and it will only do it when driving. Turning quickly with the front tires off the ground won't do it. It sounds to me like it's coming from the front right, but a passenger said it sounds like back left to him.

​​​​​​I've checked caliper bolts, hubs feel fine, control arm bushings, ball joints, coilover mounts top and bottom, tie rods, steering rack, sway bar bushings, replaced the end links, checked all suspension rubber, engine mounts, diff mount, exhaust hangers, subframe bolts, and even looked for broken bits of chassis metal. I've felt around under the seats, looked around under the dash, pulled out the spare tire and checked everything up in there on both sides. I've felt around and wiggled stuff all over the car. Searching the forums lead me to think end links, which is why I replaced those. I'm at a complete loss for what it could be and am hoping someone might have a clue.

it sounds so much like something sliding around, I originally thought it was my tool bag or maybe someone forgot a pistol or something under the passenger seat and didn't think anything about it for the longest. I've since pulled out everything that isn't bolted down and confirmed it still clunks.

The car doesn't drive any different than it ever has, it just makes this clunk noise. I leave for the Dragon here in a couple of days for the S2k meet and was hoping to fix it before flinging it around the mountains.

2002 AP1148k-ish miles
Ohlins put on about 48k miles ago (next idea is to have these rebuilt)
Cr front barSaner end links (put on while trying to resolve this)

Chuck S

Grasping at straws: Rear axle nuts been torqued to the late spec?

-- Chuck

T-Smac

I second chucks motion. Usually the noise isn't describes as a clunk but regardless if you haven't done the axle nut retorque its a free (if you have the tools) or relatively cheap thing to do that will save your rear hubs and bearings.

I think you need to take some time again to narrow down which corner its coming from. If you can duplicate at lower speeds, drive by someone in a parking lot.

vortamock

Haven't done the rear axle nuts, but I was driving it tonight the clunk seems to be coming from the front. Possibly the steering rack? Does that sound about right? It did it in a parking lot tonight as I was straightening the wheel almost at a complete stop. I was also able to do it just swerving a bit within my lane in a straight. No traffic in sight of course. Didn't seem to take quite as much... lateral force as I thought. It's not quite loosey goosey, but it isn't tight like a tiger either.

I'm gonna check the whole front end again tomorrow. It's the last opportunity to check it before the trip.

vortamock

I was able to recreate this at low speeds in a parking lot today. This seems to rule out control arms or sway bars or coilovers. That really just leaves steering rack/tie rods. I'll update this thread as I learn more.

B serious

Maybe the steering linkage coupler?

Any additional work done to the car lately?

Subframe bolts all torqued to spec? They can come loose. Don't over tighten them though.

vortamock

I closely inspected and jiggled the ever-loving crap out of everything on the front end again today. I paid special attention to the steering rack, coupler, tie rods, control arms, all bushings boots & ball joints, brake calipers, and subframe bolts. The coupler was fine and the car hasn't had any recent work. The last relevant work was changing the sway bar.


I didn't find anything out of place, loose, or otherwise out of the ordinary. I'll look again another day, but won't have time before the trip. I'm confident now it isn't something that's going fail in catastrophic fashion and throw us off a mountain.

B serious

swaybar links hitting anything?

what kind of links?

vortamock

End links were one of the first things I checked. I swapped out the OEM ones for some Saner (according to ebay) ones trying to sort out the problem. The new ones are pretty close to the coilovers, but not touching. Since I've been able to reproduce it at speeds too low to compress the suspension, those are unlikely to be the culprit.