Hey everyone,

I'm experiencing some clunking noise comming from the rear of my 1999 TL. You can hear it in the trunk, and it only happends when you drive over rough road.

Sometimes it sounds like wacking a full paint can.

Does anyone have any idea where I should look. I changed the sway bar end links about 2 years ago. I also changed all the struts about a year ago, all the mounts "looked" good at the time. I had some front end noise but that is all corrected now. I also have new tires due to bad tread beads which messed up my front end.

Thanks in advanced for your help!

 

its most likely your endlinks

 

I agree- the rear sway bar end links are broken
replace 2 (both sides) with Moog brand end links- ck kragen/oreillys for them
The sway bar moving around now is the thumping noise

 

End links or maybe the bushings.

 

They were all changed about 2 years ago (with Moog ones). They don't have any excessive play, bushing rubber is still soft, and they're not broken (unlike when I replaced them the first time). Any other ideas? Thanks for your help

 

Hmm. I would jack the rear up and check for play anywhere. There are a few arms in the rear and bushings on them.

 

check that yor spare tire is secure. Mine came a little loose once and was making clunking noises. Tightened it back up..good to go.

 

Spare... Checked.

All thoes arm's i assume they should be tight and not wiggle. Should I try to lubricate anything?

 

you can spray the rubber parts that you can see
make sure no shiny parts where 2 metal parts are touching in right condition

Ive had a sway bar hit the control arm before- just a little shiny spot finally made the diagnosis of a mystery thunk

 

excessive movement from mid muffler hitting heat shield?

 

Thanks for your help, i'll take a look when i got a chance.

 

Hey, Thanks again for helping, I checked the heat sheild and all the exhaust parts. Nothing out of spec there.

I got an audio recording of the noise while I was driving around. I left the camera in the trunk and had it record the sound. I cut out all the quiet sections to shrink down the length.

Here's the link:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KPY46-wmgto

Hopfully this can help you determine the issue.

Any sugesstions let me know. Thanks Again.

 

didnt watch the vid

Have you looked at the sway bar end links?

 

The upper mounts will not wear in a way that will cause a sound. Suspension related items could only really be a loose nut in the upper mount area, or a loose swaybar nut.

We are all only really able to guess.

Break out the 10mm socket and remove the rear seat. If you want to do more diagnosis the only way you are going to do it is have someone drive the car with you in the back seat or trunk. It sounds dumb, but I remember being a dealer apprentice and being stuffed into the trunk of a car with the seat folded to see if I could find where a noise was coming from. You need to do something more than wiggle parts in the driveway to really find the noise.

 

Video's not working uploaded sound file here:

http://members.shaw.ca/chuong/acura/noise.wav

 

So, like a solid dampened thumping sound?

 

Thanks for your reply!


Ya most the time it's thumping. Sometime there's clicks like at around 14 and 22 seconds in the sound file, i guess theres a larger hole in the road (probably a manhole) it goes thump and click click. There's a real bumpy section around 58 secs.

 

very real possibility especially since the shocks have been worked on before, shit had a brand new nylock nut backed off on me before after a couple of months, on a front shock, but a little lock-tite fixed that though it has not since (and it was tight when first installed too)
no workie for me, but probably my computer though

 

I did go back and check the nuts and retighten them. Still hasn't helped. I can pm you the sound file if you like, let me know.

I should be able to work on the car this week. Can you give me some tips on what to check. Is it possible for the ball joint on the top (upper arm??) to make noise like this.

Thanks for your help.

 

very possible


also as far as those moog ends, have they been greased recently??? (lack of greasing might have caused one to wear out prematurly, idk)


btw as far as that wave file, i just saved it instead of just clicking on it (btw f***ing fireworks lol), and it works now

 

They don't have grease nipples. I can try to grease with a needle. They're only like a year old. The werid thing is end links and bushings should only make a single noise per bump, but from the sound file, the noise kinda oscillates... idk

 

first of all, you could have turned off your music... lol

then second, doable check those bushings that go into the the strut top (like the one sitting right under the nuts), one maybe starting to fall apart, which is only showing itself right now with rough roads, so some disassembly may be required, idk without actually being there (the file does help some though lol)

 

for no grease fittings (another thing grease does is purge the dirt out, which will kill a joint in short order)



then for the link i got it from
https://acurazine.com/forums/showthr...=moog+endlinks

just saying i see grease joints on there...
(maybe they were never put in, and dirt went in that way cause of it not being sealed, idk; btw they normally don't come installed already and you have to put them in)

 

lol...Not my music, that's outside music lol, stupid loud cars. If anything I learnt the trunk is not sound proofed very well.

Thanks for the quick replies, I will check and let you know.

 

does not help when the recorder moves around either lol, but yeah sound proof, some but not like the actual interior though, as said you did not notice it till you recorded the actuall sound

 

Mine look very different haha. They look very much like OEM. I think there may have been a choice at the time for greasable or not. *shrug*

 

they should basically look the same though (alot of that is grease in the photo), and should have a little hole in that gold cover part, if indeed it is greaseable

and obviously that grease fitting too lol

 

What's been your rear jack point? If using what looks like the jack point, but is the drain hole off the trunk pan,
maybe the pan bent inward, and you are hearing the metal flex a bit.

 

Man, lol these are disgusting.

 

lol, you should know , but still better to have a constant greasing even if it does make it messy, then to never get a greasing at all


btw pm me on the cf hood or something

 

I always jack with the jack point tabs under the doors, right at the bottom of the wheel well.

 

lol, but at least you are using the correct points though, but yeah you can also jack it up under the tie down point in the center rear too, if you want the whole bak to go up at once

then the front, i would say try and jack it up underneth the crossmember, and when you put jackstands under it, put them under the framerails themselves, those little tabs bend very easy especially up front, with the weight of the engine on them