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Front driver's side suspension 'clunk'
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Sevenman   
Wed Nov 16 2016, 08:52pm
Joined: Jul 05 2015
Member No: #2241
Location: Herefordshire
 The C6 has been behaving fairly well recently, a new rear ABS sensor cured a set of warning messages, and it is going to get a gearbox flush on Friday to hopefully impressive the shifting a bit (at 110k miles it seems to hang on to gears more than I would like).

One recurrent issue that my garage has failed to fix is a clunk from the front driver's side suspension that only occurs in very specific conditions.

These are going over a steep plastic speed bump or up a small raised lip I encounter when leaving a certain car park.

Otherwise it is fine and moves through the suspension travel smoothly.

My garage has looked at it, changed a ball joint, and can't see anything else wrong.

Any ideas what to try?
gmerry   
Wed Nov 16 2016, 09:14pm
Joined: Dec 11 2009
Member No: #21
Location: Scotland
 I've had this little clunk too: only shows up when moving at parking speeds across certain small bumps.

I've had it when brand new correct SKF FRIP joints have been fitted and I put it down to a small and necessary amount of axial end play in this kind of bearing. Nothing to worry about IMHO.

Regards
G
Sevenman   
Wed Nov 16 2016, 10:04pm
Joined: Jul 05 2015
Member No: #2241
Location: Herefordshire
 What concerns me is that the passenger side is fine, drivers side only. And it doesn't feel feel right, only car I have had which does this.
cruiserphil   
Thu Nov 17 2016, 12:21pm

Joined: Jan 24 2010
Member No: #38
Location: Celbridge
 Sevenman,

A forum member visited me recently with a clunk from the driver's side like yours. Additionally we could get the clunk (less pronounced) by rocking the steering back and forth. It turned out to be slack in the steering rack on the driver's side. To check this, have someone rock the steering and feel the rack at the pinion end. Check if it is tending to move back towards the pinion.

Best regards,

Phil C.
Sevenman   
Thu Nov 17 2016, 10:07pm
Joined: Jul 05 2015
Member No: #2241
Location: Herefordshire
 Thanks for the suggestion, I will give that a go.
keithc   
Wed Dec 07 2016, 11:00pm
Joined: Apr 03 2016
Member No: #2584
Location: Kildare
 The forum member Phil is referring to is me! I had a clunk when I moved off every morning at first. Then over the course of a few months it got worse in that it was doing it at any slow moving manoeuvre or braking for sharp bends etc.

When I called out to Phil we could feel a vibration on the driver's side inner tie rod so presumed it was this. When I next called over with an inner tie rod to put on, we took off the booth to get at it and we turned the steering wheel just to make sure it was the tie rod and here we could see the rack and pinion moving/jerking up and down.

So I did a bit of reading/research and rang a mechanic who Phil had recommended for other work and he said before I go changing the steering rack to bring it to him and he would try adjusting the rack via a bolt in the pinion housing. I'm glad to say two months and few thousand kms later the car is perfect and I no longer have any clunk! It looks like the pressure plate on the rack had somehow loosened/shifted and the clunk was it returning to position after being moved with the rack when it was moving left or right.

The adjustment was made by what is labelled the yoke adjustment in the pic below
cruiserphil   
Thu Dec 08 2016, 11:45am

Joined: Jan 24 2010
Member No: #38
Location: Celbridge
 Keith,

That's great news and thanks for posting the fix. So we're off the hook for a rack change so!!

Best regards,

Phil C.
 

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