I've had a problem with my 97 GS for a while now, but it's starting to annoy me. I'd appreciate any help you guys can give me.

Here's the deal: My suspension has been making a loud clanking sound on the front right wheel. I had my alignment done, because the car need it, and the guy at the shop told me he ran into trouble there. Said the caster was broken. I know that technically, that isn't possible (his English was broken, too.)

But when I started thinking about it, it makes sense. It seems that for some reason, the caster on the car is floating, so that sudden acceleration or deceleration send it flying around, causing the clanking. It also pulls unevenly from a stop.

Does that sound plausable? What am I looking at here?

Thanks.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by notwerk &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote"> What am I looking at here?</TD></TR></TABLE>

you could start by jacking your car up removing the wheel and doing just that... looking.

oh and welcome to honda tech.

 

A clunk in suspension noise could be a ball joint.

But the steering play sounds like a Tie-Rod.

Get under that car

 

what about possibly that but maybe a combination of strut-bar bushings being worn out. i have a crx and i had a similar problem.

 

I had a clunk in my DA, it was just a sway bar bushing had rotted away. Easy fix and made the car feel so much better

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by god.loves.ugly &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">you could start by jacking your car up removing the wheel and doing just that... looking.

oh and welcome to honda tech.

</TD></TR></TABLE>

I could, but owing to my ubernoob status, I wouldn't know what I'm looking at.


I don't think it's a bushing/bearing because, like I said, that car pulls uneven when it does this clanking thing, so I'm sure that whatever it is, it has something to do with caster.

But I suppose I could be wrong about that. Would worn bushings cause the car to pull unevenly?

Appreciate the help.

 

I dont know anything ,but isnt uneven pulling,stoping = CV ?

 

A worn bushing, balljoint or bent LCA would be my guess, since the car is pulling to the left or right.

 

A lower or upper balljoint is one of the few things holding the knuckel onto the car. If you have a broken ball joint, the knuckel will move much more then it should, in all directions. This will effect not only caster, but toe and camber as well. jack up the side that is clunking. Grab the wheel firmly on top and the bottom, and rock it toward you, and away from you. If you hear a clunking sound, then you have a broken ball joint. Grab the wheel from the left and right, and rock it from side to side. If you have a clunking there, it may be an inner or outter tie rod. Both of these problems will effect steering and alignment. I suggest you have them replaced immediatly. If the ball joint is broken, and you keep driving, it can snap and you will lose steering, same with the tie rod, if it snaps, you will only be abel to turn one wheel.

 

The alignment shop is supposed to tell you exactly what parts are needed to fix the problem--that's their job, I hope you didn't pay for an alignment that isn't going to hold to specs since the parts are worn.

 

Let me throw in a few other details. The guy who did the alignment wasn't completely incompetant What he told me was that the camber was fine and that it wouldn't cause any longterm problems or uneven tire wear.

But he said that he was surprised I hadn't noticed a clanking sound when I was driving (I had, just hadn't had the time to look into it.) He said it would be noisy and that the car would pull uneven from a standstill because the caster was sliding.

The car makes a lot of noise going over bumps as well (uneven pavement and speedbumps)

Sorry I didn't get that all into the original post, didn't know what info you guys would need.

Thanks again for the help