Another 'clunk' thread...04 Taco w/clunking front end

A little more involved than the rack. Also depends on which bushings you do.

The ES bushings require separating the inner and outer sleeves from the rubber and then reusing the inner sleeve and washers. You also keep the putter sleeve in the control arm. You need to drill, torch, and/or cut the rubber out.

I used the Whiteline bushings. Press the old bushing out and press the new one in. @Timmah! Has a great video on it

Took me a full day but I also did my LBJ's and put a new rack on

 

Ah, sounds a little outside of my experience/expertise/resources range, lol. Thanks for the ideas though, I'm going to check the torque on the LCA bolts and go from there.

My '04 only has 60k miles on it but I know that bushings tend to wear down with age just as they do with miles.

 

Yea it took me most of a day and the help of 3 others. We did the rack, upper control arms, lower control arms, and 5100's. A rose bud tip makes short work of 17 year old rubber. Literally took 1 min per bushing and they were clean!

 

Check that torque
I had a clunk, they didn’t tighten down my LCA cams.

 

if so equipped, it just might be the steering stop caps are metal to metal.

 

Checked the LCA cam tab bolts when I did my brakes today, the passenger side took a few good turns of the torque wrench to get it to 96 ft lbs but unfortunately the clunking is still there. Looking more and more like it might be my tie rods.

 

Take it for what it is...
But you may be going down a rabbit-hole if you let it. If I were to redo my clunk some three odd years ago; I'd of let it go. And turned the stereo up.

I'm sure you've seen all the unresolved/undiagnosed "clunk" threads...

I replaced everything on my front end in my pursuit of finding my clunk. Eventually something I replaced "fixed" it. And it was fine for a few months. Then after a difficult trail it reappeared.
If you offroad frequently, it's just part of the game, Imo.

If I were to spend my energy (& munnies) I spent trying to fix my clunk on another truck mod, I'd do it all over in an instant. Just my $.02.

 

So...to add to the mystery of the clunk...

I was out offroading yesterday for most of the day, pretty challenging stuff (rocks, steep inclines, ruts...usual stuff that I stay in 4lo and locked for). Truck was clunking like mad like it usually does nowadays, only this morning and all day today after getting home the clunking has mysteriously stopped completely. Sounds perfectly normal. Wtf? I can turn as sharp and slowly as I want and it no longer clunks, does that help anyone here pinpoint what I might be dealing with? I'm sure it'll be back but I'm really curious

 

@eon_blue did your clunk ever come back? Did you ever figure out what it was? I am having a similar clunk. So I’m curious as to what the status of yours is.

I also have the vibration associated with the drivers side front diff needle bearing. Goes away in 4hi. I will be swapping it out with the ECGS bushing soon.

The drivers side CV to front diff connection on my truck has a good amount of vertical play. Common with the vibration. Is it possible that the clunk when turning is the CV moving up/ down in the needle bearing?

I will attempt to test this theory soon... if it is the CV jumping around at the needle bearing when I turn maybe it will also go away in 4hi. I have only had a chance recently to drive straight with 4hi on. Been busy and not many dirt roads etc in near me.

 

This happened on my old '99 Prerunner, the auto trans are notorious for the axle wrap clunk. I have a manual trans 04 now and have never had axle wrap with it.

All I remember about the '99 was that greasing the u-joints eliminated the hard "thunk" that I would get from the axle wrap and it lasted the ~2 years I had the truck. But I greased the u-joints every oil change to make sure they stayed in good shape.

 

The first post in the thread says you had a front end clunk in your 04 manual trans?

Either way I’m not having an axle wrap type rear end clunk. Mine is more like a pop sound in the front end when I turn at slow speeds.

I did have the rear ended clunk, but it it turned out to be that splines in the male end of the rear slip yoke had worn a grove into the female end. was getting hung up under compression/ depression. Got a new drive shaft with better designed slip yoke. Rear clunk eliminated.

 

Thanks for the quick response by the way.

 

Oh sorry lol I don't know why I was assuming it was axle wrap. I've dealt with a few front end clunks and the most notorious of them all came from the lower spherical bearings in my coilovers, once I replaced those the clunking went away. Spraying them with a dry PTFE lubricant helped quiet them down too.

Also used to get a clunk in the front from when the alignment shop didn't torque down my LCA cam bolts tight enough, I think the correct torque is 100 ft/lbs or close to that, I don't remember off the top of my head but it was loose on one side.

Most front end clunks can be attributed to either improper torque on the suspension, bad bearings or bad bushings.

 

Other things to check would be your lower ball joints, those will clunk and pop on turns especially if they're bad, and that's something you don't want to have fail on you.

 

Theres some good videos on YouTube showing how to check them on the ground with a jack and a prybar

 

I just replaced the ball joints with OEMs...

 

Check your cam tab bolts for proper torque, check the bushings on the LCAs to make sure they aren't bad. Same with the upper control arm bushings.

When does it clunk, when stopping/accelerating, turning, or going over bumps?

 

The truck has 207k. I’m the second owner. Ive has it since last August. I recently replaced most of the front end parts:

- CVs (torn inner boots)
- inner outer/tie rods (excessive play/torn boots)
- LCA bushings (I was in there. Once I had em out I found that there was one worn bushing on each side)
- steering rack bushings (cause why not)
- swaybar endlinks and sway bar bushings (again because why not)
- Installed SPC UCAs (for alignment considerations)

I torqued everything down to spec. Will re-check everything once I have some free time next week. I am fairly certain the culprit is the drivers side front diff needle bearing, but we’ll see. I’ll report back.

 

It clunks (it’s more like a pop) while turning. Usually turning left, but sometimes turning right. It does not always happen. I have noticed it on a few bumps too.

 

Any tips on torquing down the rear cam bolts while the steering rack is still bolted up? I can’t get a wrench in there. Not even a crows foot.