My 96 GLE has developed a clunking sound whenever I go over small bumps in the road. The car as almost 90K on it with the original suspension pieces. I tried the "high debateable" bounce test and it passed, single rebound. Over the weekend, I took both wheels off and used a 4' pry bar on the lower control arm, ball joints, tie rods, and stab bar and found no free play. I read about the strut bearing problem but there is no noise when I steer right and left with the car stationary. Before I spend money on new struts/suspension pieces, do you have any ideas? I had the car in for an alignment 2 months ago and had the mechanic look over the car and said everything was tight.

 

Check the exhaust hangers all along the car. My car had this annoying squeaking sound over bumps and I had a hard time pinpointing the problem. Took it to a front end shop, and $45 later, then repaired a "bent intermediate exhaust pipe." Sound was gone after that.

Also check the spring mounts and make sure the rubber insulation sleeves are still on the top and bottom of the coil spring.

 

Thanks for the info Eric. I'll take a look this weekend.

 

I am bringing this post back because it seems similar. I have a 95 gxe and have all new h&r springs and kyb struts...like 8 mos old. I also have just had the y-pipe and cat taken off and put back on, that is when I noticed the car was making some noises. I brought it to firestone and they couldnt find anything wrong with it. The clunk comes only after bumps. What happens is when I hit the bump a breif moment passes...really breif like milliseconds.....and then I here this clunk. Like it feels likes somethingis hanging and when I hit the bump it hits a little later fromt he after shock. Its hard to explain but you can feel it when you are driving. Especially when you hit bumps at 70 mph. I want to check the y-pipe and cat again but it seems like they are pretty tight. Any Ideas?

 

I had a Prelude that did the exact same thing. The bump noise seemed to happen just a millisecond after the bump hit. I tried everything, even took the strut out and apart to see if it had gone bad or had some noise when I dressed on the piston by hand. Nothing, smooth as silk. Put the strut back in, and my noise is still there.

Determined to fix this and suspecting it was coming from the strut assembly, I got a used strut and took out the suspecious noise maker. Problem solved. I suspect it was the valving inside the strut which was the cause of the noise.

So if all is tight on your suspension, and you pass the bounce test, there's still a chance you have a noisy strut which performs OK. See if you can swap struts with a friend. It's easier just to swap them so you don't have to take them apart. Make sure your both riding on the same springs.

 

ITs hard to tell which strut it is from..it feels like it is coming from right under my feet. But who knows. I will try that. I dont have any friends that own max's so that idea is out. But I will talk to my mechanic about it. See whats up. My other idea is the exhaust but supposedly its on. I am goiing to get underneath and check it out for myself...thanks for the idea.