Hey friends, it's Len from 1A Auto. Today we've got a vehicle on a lift and I
wanna show you how to check for a front end noise. I'm gonna let you take a listen real quick. One of the most basic things you wanna check
is checking your lug nut torque, you wanna make sure these are torqued to manufacturer's
specifications. If any of them are loose, of course this is
gonna make a clunking noise. So, one of the first things we wanna do is
get the wheels raised off the ground so we can give them a little wiggle. I'm gonna go side to side, I've got a little
bit of a clunk that way, go up and down. Not much that way, give a little spin. That sounds pretty good, no growl. All right, let's go ahead and turn this wheel
and we can take a peek at what's going on behind here. We'll start at the top. If you look right up here, you have your shock. Generally speaking, you can look right along
here. And if you see a whole bunch of fluid or accumulation
of debris and gunk, more than likely your shock/strut is no good. That can cause a banging noise. On top of the shock/strut you might also see
that there's gonna be a mount up there. If that's no good, that'll cause noise as
well. That's not really something that you can really
easily check. You have to kind of pull this out of here
and it's kind of a hassle. You'll notice you have your upper control
arm with your upper ball joint. A lot of times what you'll notice is a little
bit of play right here. If you shake your wheel, generally you'll
see it if you're pulling on the top at 12 and 6. A great way to test your upper ball joint
is to just give it a squeeze like this. Obviously, that's very bad, it shouldn't be
doing that. We'll move on down, we have our outer tie
rod end. If you see any movement between here and here,
maybe this is walking or it's popping up and down. Your outer tie rod end will be no good. You can follow this in, and it leads to your
power steering rack, and this is your bellows boot. Generally speaking, there'll be a clamp right
here, you just take that off of there, it's gonna be a single time use, give a little
twist and pull it like this. This area right here is your inner tie rod
end and has a little ball and socket. I don't know if you can see it from your angle
or not, we're right in there. You would shake the tire with your hands in
the position of 3 and 9, side to side. And if you see that popping in and out, you
know you have an issue. We can also look right here where the power
steering rack is, if you shake your wheel from left to right, you'll also notice that
this may or may not go up and down. You might hear a clunking noise from that
as well. If this is going up and down inside the rack,
it's gonna go clunk, clunk, all right? Couple things to pay attention to there. So, now we're gonna follow it down and we
can find our lower ball joint here. And this particular vehicle also has this
one right here. So, we're just gonna pay attention right there,
okay? I'm gonna grab this wheel at 6 and 12 and
I'm gonna try to shake it. At this point, you may or may not see any
movement. If you see any movement like this, you know
that those are bad. Just because you don't happen to see any movement
doesn't mean that they're fine though, I'm gonna show you something. We're gonna turn this wheel as far as it's
gonna wanna go and keep watching, ready? Can you see that walking in and out? If your ball joint is moving like that, you
know it's no good. Now, I'm just gonna turn it in the other direction
and do the same thing. Something to pay attention to as well is any
potential holes inside a boot, if you have a little pinhole it can cause a major issue
with water getting in. So, right up inside here along where your
knuckle is where the wheel bearing should be. You will check that simply by wiggling the
wheel around. If you have any clunking right up in this
area and it's not coming from any of these ball joints, odds are it's your wheel bearing. The next thing that I would check would be
the sway bar links which comes from your shock/strut and just come straight down and goes to the
sway bar. A lot of times when you hit a bump, one side
wants to go up because you only hit a pothole on one side and right inside this ball and
socket you'll hear a [clunking noise]. And that's when you know that your sway bar
link would be no good. We'll come right up here, this is your sway
bar bushings and this is where the bar mounts to the frame. They need to be rubber, and they need to be
holding right up against that bar so it can't wobble around. If you could take the bar and move it up and
down, that's another potential clunk. Another area to check is your steering shaft
right up along here. And this is the part that goes from your power
steering rack all the way up to the steering column. So, there's a little U-joint in here, you
just kind of shake this around and just see if it has any movement. It seems like the U-joint is ready to come
apart, you know you got a major issue. Okay, friends, I showed you a couple places
underneath the front end here that you can take a look for. Look for a little bit of movement, listen
for some noise, all sorts of stuff like that. Our vehicle may be a little bit different
than yours. As you saw, we've got some problems that we're
gonna have to get to work on. As for you, best of luck, I hope this helped. hanks for watching. Visit 1aauto.com for quality auto parts shipped
to your door, the place for DIY auto repair. And if you enjoyed this video, please click
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