BP Legacy suspension knock and door locks

[agusta]

Hi, I recently bought a cheap legacy 3.0r wagon and I noticed a few things wrong when I was test driving it so now I am getting around to sorting them

1: Suspension knock from front left. Have visually checked control arm bushes and swaybar but nothing obvious. Whats the next step?

2: Following that door lock tutorial, are people able to remove the door latch (covered in white plastic) while leaving that window track in place? How is that done?

Its a nightmare, I got it out with difficulty to inspect the motor which needs replacing. What a headache to return into the door (have left plastic off latch until new little motor turns up)

Cheers for the help.

[Kiwi_Fozze]

Check struts

If it has bilsteins,I will basically put money on it being the dreaded bilstein knock. Mates car does it,mine does it, know of a few others that do it too

[killervq30de]

 kwi_fozze said:

Check struts

If it has bilsteins,I will basically put money on it being the dreaded bilstein knock. Mates car does it,mine does it, know of a few others that do it too

Mine started knocking just the other day same side, I thought it was blown shock, unfortunately it was just lose strut bolt somewhere (according to mech) otherwise I could have got new front shocks under warranty

[agusta]

Oh dang, it does have bilsteins. Its only at a very low speeds, walking-running speeds. Are there bilstein shock inserts for the struts or what?

[killervq30de]

 agusta said:

Oh dang, it does have bilsteins. Its only at a very low speeds, walking-running speeds. Are there bilstein shock inserts for the struts or what?

autolign in Auckland recondition for a pretty low price, but sublabs were saying they could get a pretty good price on just replacing them out right

[McDoof]

Mine does it too. Could be Bilstein knock or LCA bushes. Replaced my struts with refurbished units and the knock persisted. I thought my bushes looked OK too, but then I jacked up the front end and they look a whole lot different when the suspension is at full extension.

[seith_31]

I just cleaned the dc motor (not prying them open) with degreaser then electronics cleaner (maf cleaner to be exact)

And yeah i did not remove the window guide. I spent about 5-10 mins trying to get the thing in again but was easy to take out. But its doable.

[sobanoodle]

Check swaybar links.

I had some annoying dull knock at very low speeds which started after some rather spiritual driving on gravel. After checking/tightening all the bits I was nearly sure that the strut was shot but then we decided to do one more test emulating the loads on that corner - turned out one of the ball joints on the link had some play in it, enough to cause some knock. Replaced the culprit and surely enough no knocks whatsoever.

[agusta]

 sobanoodle said:

Check swaybar links.

I had some annoying dull knock at very low speeds which started after some rather spiritual driving on gravel. After checking/tightening all the bits I was nearly sure that the strut was shot but then we decided to do one more test emulating the loads on that corner - turned out one of the ball joints on the link had some play in it, enough to cause some knock. Replaced the culprit and surely enough no knocks whatsoever.

How did you try to emulate it, I jacked up the front and inspected bushes with suspension at full droop. Had the pry-bar in there trying to find some play anywhere! I might try removing the sway bar in the future and driving without it to see if that eliminates it.

As for Seith_31 hats of for getting the thing in behind the window track, with those cables and rods she's a right c u next tuesday

[GorGasmSpecB]

LCA bushes is pretty common for that noise.

All 3 BL/BPs in the family had it.

[sobanoodle]

 agusta said:

How did you try to emulate it, I jacked up the front and inspected bushes with suspension at full droop. Had the pry-bar in there trying to find some play anywhere! I might try removing the sway bar in the future and driving without it to see if that eliminates it.

With the car on the ground one was holding the link and another one was pushing on that corner - the play was very apparent.

[agusta]

Would you just whip the arm off and do both of the bushes in it or how do you check which is buggered?