Front suspension clonk

[Mikie_gb]

Driving through Islington yesterday evening over the myriad of traffic humps that litter the streets it seems my front suspension has developed rather a loud clonk from the front drivers side. It wasn't there when I drove over the same humps in the morning so I am wondering what damage these blasted humps have done.

I haven't crawled about underneath the car as yet as the weather wasn't hugely pleasant this evening but I would be grateful if anyone had some suggestions of what I should look for. I have had a look on Clarks Garage website and found no reference to clonking, not even control arm issues.

 

[Peter Empson]

Hopefully it's just an ARB mount which in my experience is very common (they rust through and break under load from the bumps).

 

[wibble]

Peter - I have a similar problem. Are these items only avilable through OPC? Cheers

 

[Peter Empson]

I've not seen them listed elsewhere, but they're not expensive so that's where I'd get mine from (actually I've always had my garage supply them in the past, I think I've been through 3 sets in 11 years now []).

 

[TTM]

ORIGINAL: Peter Empson
Hopefully it's just an ARB mount

Do you mean the droplink ?
I've got a "clonk" as well on speedbumps but I guess it's caused by one of the outer edges' ARB bushing being blown as both droplink bushings are in perfect nick.

 

[Mikie_gb]

Many thanks guys. I shall have a look ASAP. As it happens I have in front of me a 968 arb and was waiting for better weather to pull off the 25mm one and replace all the bushes too.

 

[James_G]

I have just cured this problem myself. Exactly the same symptoms, potholes, speedbumps and there's a load of clonking. Even a non car focused female passenger noticed it, so it must have been bad []. I fitted new outer and inner anti roll bar bushes, OEM ones from the local OPC as it goes and the noise has gone completely. The outer bushes were shot completely so much so that the anti roll bar was literally flapping around as it wished.

While I was there I also fitted some new castor mounts, which have sharpened up the steering nicely and took no more than 30 minutes a side to fit. Bought them from Chris at Exeter OPC as they were "substantially" cheaper than from Mid-Sussex.