hey everyone

heres the context,

I took apart my drivers side wheel to remove a dust ring that was making alot of noise. While i was taking things apart, i had to seperate the lower balljoint from the lower control arm in order to slide the cv from the hub. My buddy says that once a ball joint has been unloaded, like mine, it has to be replaced. I completely ignored this, put things together, and went about my life for a few weeks.... until my car started to make a sound every time i would accelerate a little more agressively. It almost sounds like somethings is loose... i cant explain it through a post so im not going to try. Has anyone ever heard of this whole balljoint thing??

everything torqued down good?? i took apart my whole suspension 5 times already, replacing axles mainly, springs, shocks, crap like that and i havent done the balljoint. Both Herosblade and I did his car and no noises.

What I do whenever i do a job like that is assemble, tighten, drive around and tighten again. We didnt do that in Herosblades car yet because his car is so damn fresh and new

at which point did you remove it? from the wishbone (3 nuts/bolts) or at the actual joint (1 big nut)? if it was at the ball joint you may have damage the ball or socket when you separated the joint from the strut how did you separate it?

This post has been edited by Tom_SS2: Oct 1, 2009 - 4:23 AM

Providing that you took the ball joint off without damaging it it should be fine once torqued up properly. If you used a ball joint slitter then forget it cos that just distroys the ball joint.
If the boots around the ball joint still looks good and no greese has leaked out then it's still good. If you have just split it, you can clean it off and use a bit of super glue to re seal it up before all the greese comes out.

thanks for the replies everybody

to answer some questions:

I seperated the ball joint from the control arm by removing the three bolts that hold it together. no separator fork was involved.

When i had things apart i made sure to inspect all the parts and the balljoint looked like new, which impressed me considering its going on 10 years and 75K!

808, I did exactly as you said. Put things together with a torque wrench (at least for the parts that my manual had torque specs for) drove it for a few days then tightened everything down again.

I guess that rules out the ball joint..

any ideas? as far as i can tell everything looks great. This sound only comes when im accelerating from a dead stop a bit more briskly. It seems as though the weight transfer from front to back is unloading something and letting it make a very shurt clunk/stutter sound (think several rapid soft clunk sounds).

all input is really appreciated! id like to get this resolved before it gets REALLY cold around here O.O

This post has been edited by enderswift: Oct 1, 2009 - 11:43 AM

so basically you didnt take the ball joint off but the plat off the hub which holds the ball joint.
This rules out the ball joints being faulty caused by your work.
However in order to figure out more of whats making the noise I need more details liek what kind of noise? Squeeking like wheel rotation? crunching? Creeking when accelorating or breaking? Knocking? What speeds? Whilst turning? Does it go after a short drive?

This post has been edited by yellowchinaman: Oct 1, 2009 - 2:20 PM

the best way to describe it is as a light rapid knocking sound that comes from a medium acceleration from a dead stop. it does not match tire rotation, it seems related to weight transfer from the front to the back

did you put wheel bearing grease before putting the axle back in the hub??

grease? never heard of having to do that.... please explain

the bearings should already have some grease but it's recommended that you add a bit more before installing it. i'm not sure if there's a specific type of grease that should be used however..

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me too, i dunno if there is a specific grease. I do have 2 tubes of grease, one saying wheel bearing/ suspension parts and the other body/Lithium grease.

possibly CV joint knackered? how did it look? is this not the same sound you had before?

cv joint is in fantastic shape. if it was the cv, it would make noise during turns and correspond with the rotation of the wheel. This is not the same sound i had before, that turned out to be a loose dust ring. This new sound is the result of me taking things apart to fix THAT sound Could you guys give me some more details on this cv grease thing? I dont understand why a part that doesnt slide would need grease... i mean the cv stub simply rests among the splines in the wheel bearing. also, how would a 'dry' cv stub make a noise??? O.o

This post has been edited by enderswift: Oct 1, 2009 - 6:53 PM

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I'm pretty sure our wheel bearings are sealed, i see no reason for bearing grease. Maybe a bit of oil around the splines to just get the axle in a bit easier.

Have you tried rocking your car back and forth on the ground to see if you hear anything loose? You'll be able to tell if something is loose if one of your buddies rocks your car and you look around by the knuckle.

yes sir i had my buddy over today and we tried rocking the car a whole bunch of different ways but it didn't make a sound. I even had him throw it in first and accelerate up my driveway a few times in hopes of hearing the noise from outside. no luck. its silent outside but definitely noticeable from within the car, I can even feel it through the pedals. before someone asks, yes i checked my motor mounts..

well the reason i said wheel bearing grease is I was having this "worn out brake pad" noise, but it wasnt the brake pads. it turned out that my wheel bearing seal was rubbing on the axle and creating that screechy noise. after i greased it the noise went away. dunno why dont ask me cuz i dont know the noise is gone and im hafffffy anyways glad you found the source.

mystery remains unsolved sir . good job on ur screech noise though

ok you shouldn't have to greese the drive shaft to hub because you didnt touch the hub barings which is sealed. do you have superstrut? if so check the crush tubes. also diagnose any movements by moovint the wheel whilst its jacked up. i have a feeling you might have disturbed the track rod ends.

no superslut for me. this is an st204 gt 5spd. wheel is solid when i try to move it while the car is jacked up. even when i pry it with a crowbar. It seems the suspension is tight. which is good. maybe the engine is rocking so much that its hitting?? I checked the mounts and they all look fantastic... plus this only happens from a dead stop. loose mounts would mean that i should get a knock when pounding through the gears right? Im getting frustrated with this im going to take everything apart nice and slow tomorrow and take lots of pictures for you guys to look at. maybe there is something obvious that im overlooking.

can anyone tell me if this is really important?



This is the offending part from a thread i had before. It was on the drivers side where my current noise is coming from. You guys have no idea how hard it was to track this thing down. Anyway I removed it a month ago because it was loose and made a tsss tss sound everytime i went over a crack. insanity. While i had things apart, i checked the passenger side, this ring was pressed into the hub and seemed to serve no real purpose. However now that you guys are bringing up a 'sealed' bearing, im wondering if this ring what makes it sealed? is this a dust ring???

I dont thing the absence of this ring is causing my current noise as a worn out bearing would make a noise that matched the rotation of the wheel, but if its good to have it in place i might as well fix it while im at it.

once again, i really appreciate everyones input and ideas. keep em coming

TBH I have no idea what that is. If that was placed on the hub before the wheel then it's probably a hub centric ring just so that the wheel sits better. Its not compulsary.
Another thing which comes to mind is the brake hub? Could it be loose? Or the brake hose is not clipped on and is wacking against the legs?
I'm imagining the Macpherson suspension and trying to think what might knock but is not relative to the rotation to the wheels. That would eliminate the drive shaft and hub.
THis leaves the shocks and springs, steering and brakes. I've got a good feeling its the steering arms. Try grabbing it and see if you can tug in in and out? There should be no play but as you've disconnected it from the hub you may have dislodged it or finally given in.

No................not really.....................

thanks for the breakdown yellowchinaman,

if i wasn't feeling so awful right now id already be poking around and taking pics. however i am 100% sure that my breaks are not the cause here, i checked them time and again looking for signs of uneven wear on my rotor and everything looks like it should. The brakeline is secured as well. This leaves the steering and the shocks/springs. If it was the steering, wouldn't I get the same side effects as i would with a worn tie rod? or do you mean the rack and pinion? im asking because my steering works perfectly.

if i wasn't feeling so awful right now id already be poking around and taking pics.

So i was feeling alot better the other day and decided to finally get things apart. as soon as i got the wheel off it was obvious, both the ball joint and tie rod end were leaking grease. when a week earlier they were both fine. how did this happen? i dont know. The passanger side is perfectly fine but the drivers side is leaking. So maybe taking things apart can do more harm than good sometimes...

Im guessing the balljoint and tie rod were really beat to hell from the couple times i wheel hopped accidentally and all the potholes that chicago is famous for. So taking things apart was probably the last straw. Both parts are still pretty tight so im guessing if i fix the tears and pack some more grease in there i should be good until i buy some replacements. Will it still make that annoying noise on acceleration? probably. but theres not much i can do about it now

I knew it was your steering rods.
Splitting the joints are easy. But if taking it apart properly, it wont. If it's not warn, you can still inject the greese and seal the slit with superglue.

Yea you called it chinaman, but if you would have seen balljoint/tierod you would have been just as confused as i was. They were mint. Then a week later they were puking grease.