Ever since I got it on the road there has been a knocking/clinking noise from the rear of my Indy when turning into my road quickly from a heavily cambered road into a fairly steep side road. I've also noticed it when going quick over a local hump backed bridge and on a couple of larger undualtions in the road.

At first I thought something was loose and after looking closely I found a crush tube was slightly too long on the outer end of the passenger side lower rear wishbone. This was allowing the poly bushes to slide back and forth by ~2mm. I sorted this and reasembled the rear end, but the noise was still there. Closely checked all the other crush tubes, but they seem OK.

I then figured it might be the shocks reaching the limit of their extension when the load was taken off or maybe the damper extending enough to allow the spring to come loose from it's seat. With the car up on stands and the rear suspension in full droop I couldn't see anything wrong though. To test this further I raised the rear ride height by ~25mm to see if cured it. Been out again today and it actually seems worse

Any ideas what the problem is and how to resolve it?

[Edited on 18/9/07 by nick205]

Have you checked whether it does it whilst not driving... i.e. does it make the noise by jumping up and down inside the car. My guess is that it is the dampers bottoming out, even though you think it isn't. By raising the rear ride height making it worse indicates the problems lies here, lower it again and re-try.

Steve

do yoiu have a live axle? if yes, check the rose joints for the panhard rod; if they are loose in the brackets, they will clonk.

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Originally posted by Hellfire
Have you checked whether it does it whilst not driving... i.e. does it make the noise by jumping up and down inside the car. My guess is that it is the dampers bottoming out, even though you think it isn't. By raising the rear ride height making it worse indicates the problems lies here, lower it again and re-try.

Steve

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quote:

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Originally posted by 02GF74
do yoiu have a live axle? if yes, check the rose joints for the panhard rod; if they are loose in the brackets, they will clonk.

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what state are the bushes in the shocks in?

by topping out do you mean the spring outside the shock being fully extended so its not doing anything?

have you checked the wheel / drive shaft are fully tightened to their respective mounts?

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Originally posted by MikeR
what state are the bushes in the shocks in?

by topping out do you mean the spring outside the shock being fully extended so its not doing anything?

have you checked the wheel / drive shaft are fully tightened to their respective mounts?

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Sorry Nick - I meant topping out - <KN0B>...

In our's we set the ride height so that there an equal amount of movement when laden. This means that there is effectively 25mm of travel. When unladen, a small/medium shock will top the dampers out.

Ideally there ought to be a little more travel as; although it's obviously never driven unmanned, it shouldn't top out when unladen.

All IMHO - Steve

Mine tops out occasionally too.
I was diagnosing exactly the same noise and have come to that conclusion,I'm happy with my ride height tho so dont want to sdjusst it, but I might give the dampers a couple of extra clicks to see if that helps.

Check also, if you have an LSD that gives a smaller clonk sometimes when I turn tightly, especially pushing backwards out of the garage.

And, the top hub carrier camber adjuster nuts, he really big ones. Can be difficult to tighten fully allowing a slight movement.

HTH

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Originally posted by ReMan
Mine tops out occasionally too.
I was diagnosing exactly the same noise and have come to that conclusion,I'm happy with my ride height tho so dont want to sdjusst it, but I might give the dampers a couple of extra clicks to see if that helps.

Check also, if you have an LSD that gives a smaller clonk sometimes when I turn tightly, especially pushing backwards out of the garage.

And, the top hub carrier camber adjuster nuts, he really big ones. Can be difficult to tighten fully allowing a slight movement.

HTH

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I can grab the roll bar drivers side and push the car upwards and get the clunk. Not easily, it takes a couple of bounces, but definatly it, try it.