j894

2000 Accord EX coupe
4cly, auto
175,000 miles

Guys, I need your help figuring out some mystery noises in the front end of my car. Just replaced upper balljoints (entire control arm), and lowers (balljoint only)on both sides last week...as well as the D/S wheel bearing. The B/Js all felt tight when checking on the car, but made noise/rattled.

Also new as of a few months ago the front end sway bar bushings(moog), and one of the end links.

Symptom 1:
A lot of times when I go to accelerate from a stop I hear a pop, and then when I let off the gas I hear a pop as well. It also does this when I accelerate from a stop up my driveway (slight incline) and then hit the brakes, or when I'm rolling backward down my driveway and hit the brakes (when the weight shifts from front to back, then back to the front).

It has done this on occasion before but it seems to be getting more noticeable; The popping noise is kind of hollow. Is this a motor mount? just going by my own experiences on other cars it sounds like it, but that doesn't explain why it would do it after rolling back down a hill with no load on the engine?

Symptom2:
Also, is a little unrelated but I also have a rattle in the front end over bumps; it doesn't really happen much at very low speeds, just when driving around town at 15-25 mph over uneven/patched parts of the road. I never hear it on the highway or when going fast. It doesn't make noise over every bum, it just seems random and inconsistent. I heard of ball-joints doing this but I just replaced all of them on the front and I still hear it.

I also read on hear that tie-rods can cause that as well, but mine are tight; when I disconnected them from the spindle they felt tight and didn't move easy as I would expect with a worn out tie rod. Even while connected to the spindle I can yank on them with all my strength and feel no play and hear no noise.


A month or 2 ago I took the front sway bar completely off to make sure that wasn't the problem and it made no rattle noise, only the popping noise as described above. Yet, the sway bar bushings and 1 of the endlinks are brand new, and everything feels tight.


Can anyone shed some light on these mystery noises? This car seems to have more front end noises than any I've had before. I just spent a bunch of money on other front end parts, and don't want to keep just tossing money at parts that aren't the problem.

Any help would be greatly appreciated!

Thanks

j894

Also, I was just driving around and it seems when the wheel is turned all the way to the right that the popping noise (in symptom 1 above)is worse (sounds like its coming from the drivers side). This makes noise simply by letting off the gas or tapping the brake (it will do it repeatedly if you tap the brakes on and off).

It sounds exactly like a hollow ball-joint pop but the ball-joints are new. Not only that I had the same noise with the old ones. Also, the lower balljoints I replaced twice within a few days because of a problem I had with Mevotech balljoints from rockauto (still had the noise with those installed), so I don't see how the newest lowers could be bad.

Sorry if I have excessive detail, I just wanna solve this pita.

Can anyone please shed light on this, its driving me crazy?

Hondas06

Three words....... Radius Rod Bushings.

j894

I was starting to think that also after spending the past few hours searching and reading the forum.

Should I replace both side or just the one thats bad?

Usually with suspension stuff I replace stuff in pairs, but I've never messed with this stuff before and don't wanna open any cans of worms.


Edit: Honda Calls it the radius rod, I'm guessing all the parts houses call it the strut rod?? no
http://www.autozone.com/autozone/par...mString=search

Hondas06

I always say a little preventive maintenance never hurts.....replacing both is a good idea in my book. Just make sure you get the front and rear bushings in their correct places. An alignment may be necessary after replacing them.

2001B18C1GS-R

hey do u have to replace the washer and the center lil rod thing or just the bushing i orded the front and rear bushing only from honda ....but autozone sells it with front and rear bushing and washers and lil rod thing is it needed

holmesnmanny

Strut rod and radius rod bushings are the same. But this sounds more like rear or possibly front mounts to me. I would pop the hood in a spot with a lot of open area and take off and stop and see if the sound correlates with the sound of the engine flopping back and forth. Of course you can look at the front mount to see if that's bad, but they tend to go out together.

Radius rod bushings are normally built to last.