Over the past week while going into and out of my driveway, there has been an incredibly evident squeaking noise. It seems to be on the right front when most of the weight of the car is shifted in that direction. What are the possible, most likely problems? The car is an 07 TL-S 109,000 miles.

 

Could be a number of things. Lower ball joint would be my first guess to check

 

it could be a bad strut/shock or it could be the spring rubbing against the shock assembly. Spray some white lithium grease around the bottom and top of the spring and it should help.

 

Well, unfortunately, it is not the lower ball joints. I had them replaced 2 days ago (a friend and I did it together) and the problem still persist. About a week before having the ball joints replaced I took my car in for an oil change and mentioned the problem. I was told it sounded like a dried bushing. He sprayed it with WD-40, but that proved to be no help. So where do I go from here? Also, after thinking, I have wondered if it turns out to be the bushing of the lower control arm, would it be more beneficial to just replace the whole control arm? Is it possible is could be a sway bar end link or sway bar bushing? The sound has gotten worse and worse. I hear it when the right wheel hita the bump to go up the driveway. There is another driveway I go down frequently that is rather bumpy that it makes the noise sometimes. It's also very evident when going over speed bumps. I'm just ready to figure out what the problem is, but I want to be fairly educated about the possible problems.
(Sorry for any typos or misspelled words. Typed this in the Dr. office, and I don't do too good typing on the phone.)

 

A new lower control arm will set you back about $350 if you go OEM. New bushings (including compliance) will cost about $70 a side. If you can remove the LCA, take it to a shop that will press the old out and the new in.

I had the same problem with the squeaking. There is a speedbump on a hill in my townhouse community. Every time I hit it, I would hear a squeak coming from up front. Last week I had the LCA bushings (all of them) replaced, and my motor mounts. I didn't swap them out because of the sound, but the squeak has gone away. My compliance bushings were severely torn on both sides and my motor mounts were shot (I'm at 138k miles). Best of luck

 

I am not able to take out the lower control arm myself. If I just changed the bushings, how much should I expect to pay in labor? Not sure how long it takes to do. I know my shop charges $75 an hour.

 

Most shops will remove the LCA to get access to the bushings. A shop will probably charge about 1-1.2 hours to remove the LCA and then 0.2 hours to take out and press in each bushing. Expect about 1.6-1.8 hours of labor, plus the bushings themselves, so about $250 per side.

 

That's about what I figured. Just to see what the stealership would charge, I decided to give them a call. They said they didn't have time to look up the cost of parts at the time, but it would cost an insane $451 per side in labor! He stated it would take 3.5 hours to do the work. The other night doing the ball joints it took us 4 hours to do the ball joints for both sides and that is with a few problems in the process. For a mechanic who does that often, there is no way it should take over two hours for control arm bushings.

 

The mechanic I took it to charged 3.6 hours to take off both LCAs (1.2 hours to pull off each LCA and 0.2 hours for each bushing). A little overpriced but I work full time and go to school in the evenings so I don't have the time to do it myself. Paid $226 because labor was $63/hr

 

You may want to check into the upper control arm first. Maybe try spraying some silicon spray on those bushings and see what happens

 

What is the purpose of spraying silicon? Not being mean at all, I am not extremely mechanically inclined and simply don't know what this does. Also, what would indicate that it is indeed to upper control arm bushings? Thank you very much for your advice and help!!

 

It's just to see if your upper control arm bushings might be the culprit. If they are making the squeek, spraying some silicon spray on them should eliminate the noise- at least temporarily. I know it can be difficult to track squeaks down like this. I've had them before on different cars and if it is a bushing, usually hitting them with some silicon can help pinpoint the culprit. You can also try spraying the lower control arm bushings and sway bar bushings

 

All this talk about lube and no comment from Majofo?

Did you check the side motor mount?

 

Well, no luck again. Took my car to my mechanic who has worked on the car since I bought it, and I left no where closer to really knowing anything. In one of my previous post about I stated that a friend, who happens to be a mechanic, and myself replaced the lower ball joints. Well, it was move of me watching and learning, so the problem found today is in no way my fault. My mechanic found a washer that was put on wrong, so they thought that was the problem I was speaking of. After they told me that was the problem they had found, I knew that was not the culprit of the creaking sound I had been having. So, essentially, I had to pay an extra $70 for something that should have been done right the first time. After finding a place to where I could replicate the sound I had originally began working on the car for, I took the mechanic for a ride. After hearing it he says there is no way to say positively what it is because when he is at the shop he cannot get it to replicate that sound. He says the possibilities are something with the upper strut mount, control arm bushings, sway bar end links, and sway bar bushings. So the question is do I just go ahead and replace all of those things at one time? Do I leave it alone and get over it since it is just a noise? Another question is how many bushings does the control arm have? The front desk manager told me three and if I replace the bushing I needed to replace all three. I only knew of one bushing, although I am likely wrong. Any advice is greatly appreciated. I'm just pissed off at spending $320 for nothing!

 

The lower control arm has 3 bushings in total if you include the compliance bushing. Take the wheel off and see if it's torn. If it is, it would make the most sense to replace all three bushings at the same time. However, if your ride comfort isn't bad, I would ignore the noise by turning up some music