i have a very puzzling problem related to the rear suspension and was wondering if any experts out there could help provide some suggestions on how to fix it.

since i installed my sway/tie bar combo last summer, the handling on my teg has been rock solid and sublime with near neutral handling.

just earlier this week while cruising down the highway to work, i hear this pretty loud "pop" come from the rear of the car near the tires. i thought i had run over something big that hit my suspension but didn't see anything behind the car in the mirror. so fearing the worst, i thought maybe an endlink had snapped or something and played with the steering a bit and it was indeed "looser" and understeered very noticeably in corners/curves.

i just jacked up the rear this morning to take a look and it looks fine. all the bolts holding the sway bar are in place and the endlinks are all still there tied down pretty well. does not look like anything broke or is missing. i've had the bar on the "middle" setting all this time.

any suggestions on how to further isolate the problem? if the sway bar is still in place, is there anything else in the suspension that could make it understeer like that again (basically offset the benefit of the bigger sway bar)?

cliff notes: loud "pop" noise heard in the rear suspension area a few days ago. nothing looks broken or missing on the comptech sway/tie bar unit but the car is understeering again. any clues?

TIA!

 

Check all suspension bolts and mounting points, both front and rear, top and bottom. Check the front sway bar, upper and lower shock mounting bolts, control arm bolts and mounting points, etc etc. I would say just throw the whole car up on 4 jackstands, remove the wheels, and crawl around under there looking at everything carefully.

 

Retorque all the bolts. Something is probably loose is has shifted.

My bet is on one of the sway bar brackets.

 

Loose means oversteer.

You probably just hit a rock. But remove the end links and bushings on the chassis mounts and check them out anyway.

 

Torn Trailing arm bushings???

 

ya your should probably try retightening all the bolts

 

You know... I'd hate to suggest this as a possibility. But maybe sub-frame tear out?

Take a look at the subframe as see if the support has ripped the subframe at all.

I cross my fingers that the problem is something simpler than that.

 

well, after more driving to see what was wrong and having my mechanic take a look at it, it feels stock sometimes (unsteers) and the way it is supposed to be at others. my mechanic checked everything out in the rear and couldn't find anything wrong either. this is after i got underneath to take a look also.

actually, after he removed the wheels and greased a lot of the joints with WD40, it started to be a bit more neutral again. the only thing that he mentioned that might make some sense as to what happened was broken weld?

everything is still on there nice and tight and definitely no subframe tear out. but maybe due to the stiffer rear, one weld in particular may have given out? i'm not sure. it feels fine most of the time, but at others, it feels like it is noticeably understeering.

well, nothing is broken really, so i guess there's not much to do but keep on motoring!

 

Bushing Binding?