Date: Mon, 04 May 1998 07:33:16 -0700 Hello all, short note to let you know the source of a front end clunking
I've had in my car for over a year now.
Turns out the front lower control
arm (Maz PN: F131-34-350B@$341 from Maz Comp) is integrated with the lower
ball joint. It appears that the ball joint was out of round and would have
some non-linear behaviour when stressed(autocrosses for example).
It has been hard to find until lately when it has been doing it every autox. I was
initially convinced that it was my camber/caster bolts as it seemed that
I'd get positive camber every time this clunk came about on course. They
needed to be changed too, but that did not stop the clunking. Backing out
of a parking spot and the accompanying steering lock occasionally would
cause the clunk too. On course when it happened the car would suddenly
understeer (push) violently just after the clunk. Had an autox this weekend
and voila-no clunk. Hopefully this could be of some help to others-as we
well no-there are NO unique 3rd gen problems!
________________
From: Jim King This happened to me at a track day at the Streets of Willow course in So. Cal.
a month ago. I went wide (used 102% of the road :) at the exit of a chicane
and put the front passenger side off into a sort of pothole. It made a mighty
loud bang but all seemed OK after coming back in to check things out.
Later in the day during the last session something "changed" (no thunking) and
it started understeering like a pig, right in the middle of a long left handed
180.
Turns out the pothole incident deformed the lower control arm ball joint and
bent the bolt coming out of it about 20 degrees. This effectively loosened
the crown nut, too. The bolt was now more of less free to turn due to
suspension loading. In the afternoon it broke free and swung around 180
degrees changing the alignment (by moving the bottom of the knuckle arm) from
some toe-in to massive toe-out (well, maybe 1/4"). It was obvious looking at
it.
I limped it home this way, with the car pulling strongly to the right, and
didn't find out exactly what was wrong till it took things apart later. Funny
thing is I pulled into a fast foot driveway half way home and it shifted again
and the rest of the trip home the car tracked straight with who knows what for
toe-in (or out).
Moral of the story, I guess, is stay on the pavement and avoid potholes in
day-to-day driving.
________________
Date: Tue, 29 Sep 1998 20:13:51 -0700 Had a similar problem, left turns during acceleration was the worst. Could
also get the noise on very heavy straight-line acceleration, but not as loud
or often.
It was the driver's side engine mount.
This mount is "pulled apart" when the engine is accelerating, and when
turning left the engine also wants to lean to the passenger side of the car,
adding to the "pulling apart" of the engine mount.
It is very difficult, (impossible) to see if it is broken, until you remove
it, then it is very obvious.
_______________
Date: Wed, 16 Sep 1998 19:29:47 -0700 Every right turn my car would make a clank-clank-clank sound. Ended up the
studs that go through the caliper and hold the pads on lost the clip that
holds them in place. I'd turn right, one of the studs on the left front
caliper would slid out, and each spoke on the rim would hit it (clank,
clank) and knock it back into place.
_______________
There is a TSB on clunking on the 93s that recommends replacing some of
the suspension parts (not sure which ones). Go to the TSB section of this
site (from the main page), and follow the instructions there to get the TSBs.
--Steve
_______________
Date: Tue, 20 Oct 1998 09:17:00 -0400 >I notice when i drive my 93 straight and slightly turn the wheel left My 93 and 88 had the same kind of noise. New wheel bearings fixed it. Could
try re-packing the things, but at about $50 (I think) it's cheaper / better
/ easier to replace IMO.
_________________
Date: Tue, 8 Dec 1998 23:11:46 EST I had a clunk in my front suspension since I bought the car. I had it
checked and found that the bushings in the upper A arm allowed excessive
movement. I was told that it wasn't a safety problem, but I worried about
handling due to changing steering geometry.
The pivot point to this bushing is actually a metal "tube". The bushing limits
noise and softens the road harshness (mines an R1 so it doesn't feel like it
softens it much).
I wanted urethane bushings, but couldn't find anyone who
made them. I watched the movement (on a rack, not on the road! I'm not
insane!) and realized that if I could limit the fore and aft motion I could
live with these bushings until such time as I could find urethane. (By the
way I was warned by 3 Mazda shops against replacing just the bushings. They
wanted me to replace the whole A arm because they had heard of several people
bending the A arm when the bushing was pressed in place.)
I took the upper
arm off and found that the inner metal tube had a diameter of approximately
.625" and the OD of the bushing was 2". I made a trip to my local C&S
Hardware store and found out that a standard 3/4" washer had a hole diameter
of .75" and an OD of 2". I spent 80 cents and bought 2. It was simplicity
itself. It took me about 15 minutes to install them as "spacers" on the back
side of the rubber part of the bushings. It does not interfere in any way
with the metal inner tube. They fit as if they were made for that purpose.
They did not cause any binding in the assembly as the assembly tightens down
to the inner metal tube, not the rubber bushing. I still have the flex and
shock dampening, BUT NOW I AM NOT ASHAMED TO DRIVE MY CAR! The noise is
completely stopped and it did not change my front end alignment.
_________________
Noise or vibration that happens only under braking is possibly caused by
warped brake rotors. There will also be a vibration or shaking while braking.
--Steve
_________________
Date: Sat, 20 Mar 1999 12:08:53 -0800 Wheel bearings tend to rumble/grumble for some time before they start to
squeal. If it is the bearing going, then jack up the opposite wheel to the
turn side that makes it make a noise (ie if turning left makes it squeal,
then it is probably the right wheel) and turn the wheel by hand - you will
probably hear some pad noise as well as the potential bearing noise. Grip
the top and bottom of the wheel and see if you can wiggle it. Even with
decent bearings you may get a millimetre or two of play, but should get no
more. If it is the bearing squealing, then replace it as soon as possible -
I suspect that you would notice the rubbing/grumbling noise beforehand, so
think it unlikely.
_______________
The stock anti-sway bar mounts have a tendancy to tear away from the frame.
This will cause some noise (not sure of exact sound). David Breslau of Widefoot
sells re-inforced mounts available from him or
Crooked Willow.
Trev Dagley (Netblazer)used to make similar ones (he originated the concept).
--Steve
_______________
From: Phil Weber I have noticed the front end clunk in my car also while autocrossing (athough
it is rare). I also drove another SS RX-7 that has had many more autocross and
track events on it. The front-end clunk was much more pronounced and
frequent.
If you look at the three holes where the top of the shock pokes
through under the hood you will notice that the holes are slightly larger than
the bolts on the shock and the three nuts really don't have a whole lot of
surface area to grip onto. In the the other car you could actually see the
scrape marks that were left from the nuts sliding around. The amount of
movement is very small but in a relatively high G turn it only takes a small
suspension geometry change to upset everything. This may or may not be the
same thing you are experiencing, just something to consider.
________________
Date: Thu, 1 Apr 1999 10:15:21 -0800 >I have a cricket-like sound being generated by the chassis somewhere This could be a loose hood latch. I used to wrap the metal part of the "U"
(not the hook) with some duct tape but it would wear through and I'd have to
keep replacing it. Some sort of durable bushing would do the trick.
Probably could adjust the hood latch or bump stops to hold the hood tighter
but I was lazy :-)
_________________
Date: Tue, 6 Apr 1999 00:31:13 -0400 Just for another data point, I recently had a pop in one corner of
my front suspension, especially during turn and suspension travel. I was
convinced it was bushings until I noticed that the weld fixing the sway
bar stud into my tubular PFS sway bar was fractured allowing about 1-2 mm
of in/out travel of the stud within the weld during suspension travel,
"popping" as it went.
_____________
Some people found that some downpipes (aftermarket) will rub/bump,
causing noise from the front end. --Steve
_____________
From: David Breslau (breslau@space.mit.edu) Failed grease boot, rough feeling when moving the ball joint by
itself, varying tightness/looseness over its movement range.
Other things for you to check are all the heim bearings in your
suspension that are non-stock. I'll bet your Penske shocks use heims, and if one of them
has seized from exposure to debris or wear, it could introduce noise. The
JRZ's I got recently use a heavy-duty rubber sleeve, similar to what the stock
shocks use.
________________
Date: Thu, 13 Apr 2000 23:18:57 -0500
From: "Jonathan S. Ott" My RX-7 did the EXACT same thing--first, rubbing sound while accelerating
through a left turn, then progressing to rubbing sound while accelerating
even when going straight. Looking underneath, I found shiny metal surfaces
on the downpipe and frame where they had rubbed. Rotary Performance
replaced the passenger side motor mount and I have had no trouble ever
since.
_________________
This could also possibly be caused by a bad PPF (Power Plant Frame). --Steve
Date: Wed, 6 May 1998 02:29:14 EDT I had a clunking noise from the rear of my recently purchased '93 Base w/ 60K.
It would clunk when engaging the clutch (esp. from a forward gear to reverse),
hitting the brakes, or driving over a bump in the road. I posted a question on
the list but the only responses were from others with the same problem.
Upon inspection of the rear suspension with both wheels jacked off the ground,
I could rotate each of the rear wheels over 1/8" as measured at the outer tire
surface. I am not a fan of RWRS (Rear Wheel Random Steering) so I replaced
what appeared to be the worst offending bushing. This was the bushing on the
rear toe control link where the link attaches to the wheel hub (not the frame
attachment point).
I used the factory replacement bushing FD01-26-230 ($101.20 for the pair).
Mazda Comp has a replacement they claim is 40% stiffer than stock but I went
with the stock replacement for SCCA classing reasons. The replacement took
about 2 hours for both sides. Mazda has a special SST that would significantly
reduce this time. I used a very large C-clamp and a carefully choosen closed
end wrench and socket. A large vise would have been helpfull.
The result is a much quieter rear end and noticably improved cornering (no
more RWRS). The lower control arm bushing is still a little loose and will be
replaced later but the biggest offender was by far the toe control arm
bushing.
_________________
Date: Tue, 22 Sep 1998 14:30:10 -0500 After 3 rounds at the dealer they finally fixed the severe rear clunk/crack
I was getting during momentum shifts or bumps. It was the rear I-arm
bushings, they replaced both I-arms (about $500 each) and viola, smooth
sailing, clunk is %100 gone. This was of cource after the Maz-duh dealership
replaced the motor mount and rear diff bushings in an attempt to fix the
problem. Good for me though, because the drivers side motor mount was
destroyed and new diff bushings at 80K miles can only help. Fortunately my
extended warranty (long battles with them) paid for each repair. Total cost
was around $3000 (parts and labor) and I paid only $250 for the warranty
deductible. Thanks good I keep on them and thanks again to Brooks for his
early help against the warranty company.
The I arm is easy to get to so I assume if you were to purchase the bushings
separate and put them in yourself it wouldn't be too costly. Just a pain in
da but to get the bushings in the I-arm, if it is even possible. :-o
Next step, see if they will replace my rear diff, there is way too much
play, bouncing (smashing is a better term) back and forth, slowly pulling
the car apart. Wish me luck :-)
_______________
There is a TSB on clunking on the 93s that recommends replacing some of
the suspension parts (not sure which ones). Go to the TSB section of this
site (from the main page), and follow the instructions there to get the TSBs.
_______________
Differential trouble can also cause rear end clunks. I am not sure about the
diff in our cars, but on one occassion I broke a lot of the teeth off of the
ring gear in the 10-bolt rear on my old Firebird. This ended up causing a lot
of clunking and shuddering from the car when it turned in one direction, regardless
of speed and smoothness of the pavement. --Steve
_______________
Date: Wed, 25 Aug 1999 15:10:08 -0400 The problem is with the differential mount bushings. These are located
above the differential in the rear. They are grease filled with a metal
center sleeve and a metal outer sleeve.
They are difficult to see, but you can normally see the leaking of the
grease as it leaks on the open drive shafts and then gets throw every
where under the car.
You need to drop the drive shaft, the PPF and then the diff itself to
get to them. There is a bracket that attaches to the top of the diff and
that is where they are located.
Brooks and I replaced his when he broke his diff recently. We replaced
them with solid replacements and he noted that the thump went away.
I have yet to do this, if for only a lack of funds.
I am pretty sure this is the cause of the problem.
Also while you have the diff out... Make sure you swap the fuel
filter... It takes 5 minutes when you do it this way... :-)
_______________
Date: Tue, 13 Oct 1998 16:38:21 -0400 The toe control links are the most common cause. I've attached a previous
post on how to check them.
Be forewarned they are expensive. I just ordered the bushings for one side
from Mazda Comp for about $65. The whole link was $180.
I spoke to Brian at Mostly Mazda the other day and he said he is close to
releasing a replacement link they will be much stronger and much cheaper.
This will probably be the best solution.
>From: Jim Young ______________
Date: Tue, 09 Feb 1999 22:30:06 -0500 My car was pretty clunkful in the rear until I installed Mostly Mazda's trailing arms
and toe links. Tightened up the rear end noticeably. Before the installation, if the
car was rocked back and forth or driven over rough surfaces, you could hear a loud
"thunk" or a "dok" coming from the rear suspension.
______________
Date: Wed, 10 Feb 1999 22:43:06 -0500 Well, I was going to wait until it was fixed to post, but I have
faith that it'll be done soon. I have a '93 R1 that was making a
clunk when the rear suspension unloaded. We were able to
recreate the noise by doing the following: Jack up the rear end,
place hands on the tire at 3 o'clock and 9 o'clock positions, and
jiggle it (technical term) :-)
Anywho, he was reasonably certain that the bushing in the
middle of the lower control arm (where the trailing link attaches)
was the problem. One side was making major noise, and the
other minor noise, so I went ahead and ordered two new control
arms from Mazda Comp. (Gotta stay stock for autox.) Did
I mention ouch$? Hate to see what they'd cost at a dealer.
Anyway, he said that while replacing bushings like that in aluminum
arms you run a good chance of buggering up the arms, and more
than one person has said other suspension parts may have been
picking up the slack for the failing ones, so I went for the whole
arm. They'll go in tomorrow, and we will see if that fixes it.
_________________
Noise or vibration that happens only under braking is possibly caused by
warped brake rotors. There will also be a vibration or shaking while braking.
--Steve
_________________
Date: Mon, 05 Apr 1999 09:11:07 -0400 I had been hearing a clanky/rattling noise coming from the
rear of the car. It sounded like it was coming from beneath
the hatch area while driving over rough pavement.
Turns out it was the outer toe link bushings. I bought two
replacements from MazdaTrix. It took about 45 minutes for
me to install them. No more noises now!
FWIW, there was an extremely small amount of lateral play
in the bushings I took out. So small, that I wouldn't have noticed
if someone had handed them to me and I hadn't already suspected
a problem. Apparently that small amount of play is greatly
magnified with the weight of the car and other applied stresses.
Also, Mazda Competition and Mostly Mazda offer replacement
bushings that are supposed to be about 40% stronger. However, I
didn't get them because both places were telling me that it would
be three to four weeks before they would have them in. The bushings
from MTrix were about $54 each (you need two).
_________________
Date: Mon, 05 Apr 1999 16:50:52 -0400 I noticed that if I kicked one of the rear tires or pushed the car from side
to side I could hear the popping. I jacked the car up, grabbed the
tire on either side and pushed on one side while pulling on the other and
vise versa (as if checking the bearings on the front). I could feel a very
slight pop in there so I knew something was loose. I then had a friend do
the same thing while I was under the car. If you put your hand on the various
components while someone is doing this, you will eventually be able to
feel the pop in the component that is bad. I found it quickly as the
toe-link was the only component that seemed to support the hub assembly
against that sort of lateral movement. The inner toe-link bushings were fine
on mine... it was the outers that were bad. The outers half the size so they
probably always die first.
___________________
Date: Sun, 18 Mar 2001 09:37:30 -0500 I found the source of my rear suspension clunkiness. Two bushings seem to
have some play. a) Toe-links' outer bushing b) Lower control arm middle
bushing. This finding is consistent with Ciriani's archived documents.
I managed to press out the toe link bushing by simply hammering it out using
a 30mm socket as a support to the link itself and a 22mm socket to sit on
the bushing itself. You have to wack it quite hard. I used a small sledge
hammer.
As for the lower control bushing I cannot use the same elegant "wack it out"
technique because the arm is still on the car. I have found the following
website that can inspire one to make his own DIY Bushing Removal tool.
http://marcswanson.ne.mediaone.net/~jshadzi/bushing_tool.html
I hope this will help some of you that are contemplating to finally get
under the car to find and fix those nasty suspension clunks.
___________________
Date: Mon, 5 Apr 1999 14:31:07 -0700 I didn't have any noises coming
from the rear, but I felt a funny wandering in the rear of the car,
especially when thrust forces would change while cornering. I knew of the
common test of wiggle in the rear wheels with your hands in the 9 and 3
o'clock positions to check for movement. On both rear wheels, I had about
1/8 inch of movement on the outer edge of the wheel. It didn't seem lilke a
lot, and since there's no movement while wiggling the wheels with my hands
and 12 and 6 o'clock, it didn't seem right, either.
Everyone else had replaced the outer bushings when confronted with this
problem, so I ordered a set of bushings from MazdaComp and got to work. It
was actually one of the quickest procedures I'd ever done on the car and in
about an hour I had the bushing replaced and the car put back together. Of
coures, I still felt movement when I wiggled the wheel.
I ordered another set of bushings from MazdaComp, this time the inner set.
These bushings are more difficult to change as they have a metal lip that
overlaps the control arm, making it impossible to get any leverage to push
the bushings out. The manual shows a Mazduh mechanic using a hacksaw to cut
the lip off, which is a pain in the ass. I used a combination of a grinding
wheel and a hacksaw to cut the lip off. It was a pain in the ass. I put
the bushings back into the control arm and put the arm back on the car. The
movement was completely gone.
All four of the bushings that I took out seemed to be okay until I actually
compared their feel against the brand new bushings. I biggest clue should
have been when I moved around the insert on the inner bushings, it would
seem to separate from the rubber part. It seemed minimal at the time, but
the newer bushings didn't do this at all.
______________
Some aftermarket exhausts (cat-back) will hit or bang against the rear
underbody. It will cause some vibration as well, under throttle or when
letting off. --Steve
______________
Date: Tue, 22 Jun 1999 09:15:29 -0500 Sounds like your rear toe-control links are going out. Having the same
problems with mine, but only when I'm turning left and I get on/off the
throttle. Maybe it's time we get a group-buy going on Mostly Mazda's
"competition toe-control links".
_______________
Date: Wed, 24 May 2000 09:23:51 -0400 The putative culprit has been found, so to speak (uhh..write). A few days
ago I posted the following and had many inquiries and suggestions regarding
my problem:
Many of you suggested the pillow ball bushings in the control arms and/or
trailing arms. After looking at Steve Cirian's site, these suggestions
appear to be the logical route.
It turns out that, in fact, the _new_ M2 trailing arm had a faulty or loose
heim joint. Under acceleration or load the joint would move from side to
side (around the ball). The metal to metal contact was creating this nasty
clunk. Brian Richards kindly sent me a replacement arm. Apparently, he's
never seen this before with these arms. I'm going to send him the "noisy"
arm so he can better determine the cause. I guess we should label this a
rare event and those with these trailing arms shouldn't worry. Anyone have a
similar episode with these arms?
_______________
From: Roderick Newstrom I had the same feel... like the front end was torquing to the left while the
rear end got real light. It got to the point where I was scared to corner
over washboard for fear of the rear end coming loose. Mariah motors replaced
all struts and an upper ball joint in the rear and everything is GREAT now.
Ed.'s note: most likely the ball joint fixed it.
_______________
Date: Mon, 20 Dec 1999 02:40:54 -0800 Either your toe control links (1st culprit) or your trailing links. Solution
is either to (1) press in new Mazda bushings or (2) get the revised
suspension parts from M2 performance ("www.mostlymazda.com "), then "M2
performance", then "suspension".
_______________
Date: Tue, 25 Jan 2000 22:47:26 -0800
From: Max Cooper (max@maxcooper.com)
Try the same thing with the wheel removed. I tugged my wheel around and
noticed nothing once. I did the same thing with the wheel removed and it
was clear that both my toe links and the fore/aft links had bad
bushings. I have the suspension clunks, but haven't done anything about
it yet.
Ideally, I'd like to get the M2 toe links and new bushings for the
trailing links. I might get the M2 trailing links, too, but I think the
most important bushing is the one in the lower arm, which I don't think
gets replaced by the M2 trailing links.
Front
From: Derek Punch
Date: Wed, 31 Mar 1999
From: "Derek Vanditmars"
> If I accelerate briskly through a fairly tight left turn
> (easiest to do on a winding on-ramp, for example) I get this loud
> clunking sound, "bam bam bam". During normal driving going over uneven
> pavement, I can barely sense the sound of something moving around that
> shouldn't, but I usually only get the loud repetitive banging while
> turning left and accelerating. From the way it sounds, I thought it
> would be obvious when they looked underneath the car, but apparently it
> wasn't. Any ideas? Anyone else encounter this?
From: "Peter Roosakos"
From: "Rad Man"
>its quite. When i turn the wheel slightly to the right, it sounds like
>a rubbing of some sort, but only when i turn it right. My fender liners
>are out, so i know its not that. Im thinking, it might be a wheel
>bearing or a bushing??? Any suggestions or ideas?
From: FSBOREGIS@aol.com
From: Stephen Stanley
Date: March 31, 1999
From: Peter Wong
>near the drivers side up front.
From: "C. E. Howell"
Date: April 14, 2000
>If I take the suspension apart, how do I know if the ball joints are bad? Any
>looseness? From what I hazily remember of the original install 3 years ago, I
>think the shop manual has you attach a spring scale to the ball joint to
>measure resistance before it moves.
>I've got a rather odd sound occasionally on my 93 R1. when either taking a
>left hand corner or accelerating hard, I get a rubbing/grinding/vibrating
>sound. it seems to be coming from around the top of the
>transmission. I've ruled out motor mounts by inspecting the passenger side
>and replacing the drivers side, and I'd expected that to fix
>it. Unfortunately it now seems even worse. It's been getting
>progressively worse as time goes on, in that I can make the noise happen
>more often. Initially it would only be heard when taking off around a left
>hand corner, where engine torque and centrifugal force were both trying to
>twist the engine. At this point, my plans are to drop the transmission and
>look for any indication of rubbing, hopefully I'll be able to at least find
>the source. If anyone has any suggestions of what else i should look at
>while the transmission is out, I would appreciate it. This noise is
>driving me nuts, and my current plan to drop the tranny is coming up on a
>desperation move.
Rear
From: JYoungCJ
From: "Dela Huerta, Damian"
From: Tom Walsh (TWalsh@achieversusa.com)
> From a dead stop, when engaging into first gear, there is a
> clunk in the rear (clutch in still depressed) and it occurs
> up to 3rd gear. Keep in mind that the clutch is depressed
> when the clunk occurs. Only happens from a dead stop.
From: "Alan Beder" (albeder@earthlink.net)
>
>The best method to check your toe adjusters is to jack up a wheel and place
>your left hand at 9:00 and your right hand at 3:00 on the wheel. If you can
>noticably move the wheel as you alternately push/pull with your left/right
>hand, your toe bushings are worn. Mine were so bad at 60K that I had almost
>1/4" of movement.
>
>The most obvious symptom is the noise, but it will affect handling and tire
>wear.
From: "Shiv S. Pathak" (shivp@worldnet.att.net)
From: Jennifer Wilson (racergrl@erols.com)
From: David Disney (disney7@icx.net)
From: David Disney (disney7@icx.net)
From: "David Ieroncig" (Rx7@Rocketship.com)
Subject: (rx7) [3] Clunking culprits & DIY Bushing Removal Tool
From: "Lou Young" (lou@hell-bent.com)
From: "Eng, Cary" (Cary.Eng@COMPAQ.com)
Subject: (rx7) [3] Jumping and pitching while accelerating
>Having a not so minor problem under acceleration. Any acceleration,
>not just drag racing. The front of my car is pitching up and to the
>left and feels real loose out back at the first instant when I get on
>it. I *think* it is the rear bushings I've heard people mention from
>time to time wearing out. I cranked my struts up all the way and it
>didn't seem to help much, if at all.
From: Gene Felber (gfelber@talussolutions.com)
Subject: RE: (rx7)[3] Worn subframe bushings for M2 trailing arms
After having the trailing arms installed the driver's side rear suspension
makes a nasty clunk. Never had this before. I jacked the car up and rotated
the offending wheel where I noticed the clunk was emanating from the area
where the trailing arm meets the rear subframe (not the control arm).
Removed the bolt and metal sleeves (bushings, I guess) and noticed quite a
bit of play between these and the subframe. That is, it appears that the
holes for the bolt assembly have been sufficiently worn to cause the
trailing arm to move up and down over bumps and the like. I checked the shop
manual and didn't find any parts resembling bushings for the subframe mount.
Is this correct? Or, perhaps, is it possible that the play is due to worn
pillow ball mounts in the rear control arm causing too much movement in the
trailing arm?
Subject: (rx7) [3] Jumping and pitching while accelerating
From: "schaefer" (normandy99@email.msn.com)
>My car lately has started a thud sound every time I brake. Not loud,
>but noticeable. To me it seems to be caused by inertia. When I brake
>(as opposed to accelerating) I hear this sound somewhere from the
>back of the car."
> Recently, my rear suspension has developed a loud knocking noise. I notice
> it when braking, driving over rough roads (which is just about everywhere in
> Boston) and during changes in momentum. After reading through old posts on
> the subject I was convinced that it was the bushings. However, recently I had
> the car up on a lift and tugged at the rear wheels from various angles and
> didn't notice any measurable looseness. It did flex a small amount, but
> nothing beyond what I've seen on other cars. If what I said is accurate,
> could it still be a bushing problem, or should I look at other components
> such as the shocks? The car is a 94 with 49k on it. If anyone has any
> insight, please let me know.
![[ Mail me ]](mail.gif)
![[ To Lightning home page ]](rx7_home.gif)
![[ To my home page ]](my_home.gif)
![[ Copyright Notice ]](copyright.gif)