Strut rod bushings

[Dern Humpus]

I have been trying to track down a clunk for quite some time now. I have replaced both lower ball joints with moog parts, as well as inner and outer tie rods. I thought the final culprit was the uppers. I disconnected them from the knuckle today and they seem perfectly fine. I am assuming they have been replaced before (I bought the car at 95k miles, now has 115k). I pried on the ends of the strut rod and it seemed to move a bit more than I would have expected. Have people had problems with these before?

 

[02LSE96LSC91SE84TC]

The bushing between the strut rod and the lower control arm is a common problem. $10 part but they make alot of noise when bad. You can rock the wheel front to back if they are real bad, kinda roll it back and forth.

 

[04SSHD]

I noticed the same noise when I come out of a sideways fishtail...

 

[Dern Humpus]

The rear ones were the ones that concerned me. One of them had some movement in it when I pried on it, but the other didn't. Im assuming the one that could move was bad. Do I have to remove my LCA again to replace it?

 

[02LSE96LSC91SE84TC]

Do I have to remove my LCA again to replace it?

Thats how I did it, I don't think you can any other way.

Probably don't have to seperate at the ball joint though, I can't remember for sure if I did but I definately removed from the K member.

 

[unity]

If you are strong, no you dont. There is enough room to just replace the rearward bushings without loosening anything else or taking it out. I did both sides with not too much difficulty.

 

[02LSE96LSC91SE84TC]

That lower bushing of the LCA at the k member must have been screaming

 

[chicken]

did it with a "port-a-power" but it was scarey

 

[unity]

Not really, the strut rod ends near the END of the LCA, so there is enough play to pull back and get the rod out, replace the one bushing, pull it back together and add the outer bushing and tighten up. A lot easier than removing the LCA which would require and alignment, but then again if the rod bushings are really bad an alignment would be a good idea anyway.

 

[1wykdmk8]

I replaced mine as well, but I removed everything since I was doing a full poly front end replacement. You do not have to remove the LCA to do it. Cause I replace the strut rod bushings on my old car without removing the LCA's.