Steering clunk

There’s some kind of steering clunk going on. At a dead stop and very low speeds there’s a clunk/pop and then the steering wheel will be slightly off. New upper control arms and ball joints and outer tie rods. Lower ball joints seem fine and inner tie rods feel solid. Having a tough time with this one.

 

In the worst case it could be the rack skipping teeth. Never seen that myself. But if it continues, the steering wheel offset could eventually break the spiral cable, disabling cruise control and radio controls -- inconvenient and costly to repair. Also, you could suddenly lose control and crash into a Mercedes, and your airbag won't deploy either. So this is an important problem to rule out first. Have someone watch your front tires as you crank the steering wheel through one of these 'clunks.' If the tire angle slips backwards as the steering wheel lurches forward, especially if this is repeatable in the same direction, then something is terribly wrong. Fix this immediately, or buy better insurance.

Next, check if the lower control arm bolts are loose. These are sometimes called the alignment cam bolts, because they are more complicated and expensive than regular bolts, and they can be adjusted as part of an alignment job. (Unless you live in the rust belt -- then you must first cut these bolts out with a Sawzall and buy new ones, before an alignment job can proceed.) Slightly loose LCA bolts can make loud clunks during low-speed or reversing turns. Or they can slip completely out of alignment if they are really loose. This is a common problem.

Here is how to check if your lower control arm bolts might be loose: Spray everything down with penetrating oil, then for each bolt, hold the opposing cam in place with a wrench and tighten the bolt with a torque wrench set to 100 ft-lbs. If the bolt turns before the wrench clicks, then it was too loose. Go get an alignment, then right there in the parking lot, grab that 100 ft-lb torque wrench again and make sure all four bolts are tight. Mark the cam positions with paint, in case the bolts come loose in the future. Alignment shops tend to under-torque these bolts, and supernatural forces sometimes loosen them during the Halloween season.

If instead your LCA bolts won't budge at 100 ft-lbs, then you're probably good, but maybe make sure they aren't hopelessly seized either -- perhaps by backing them off slightly and re-torqueing. Make sure to mark the initial alignment position, in case it slips!

Your problem could be something else of course. In addition to the ball joints and tie rods as you've mentioned, there are two bushings linking each control arm to the frame -- and two more holding the steering rack to the front cross-member. That's already 10 bushings, and they could all be completely worn out. Unfortunately the only way to know if a bushing is worn-out is to replace it and see if the problem goes away. Only then will you know for sure that the old bushing was perfectly fine. So if everything else looks good, go ahead and needlessly replace all the bushings. Perhaps by then someone else can chime in with a better idea.

 

Thanks I’m gonna check the bushings after work and pray that might be it. I’ll check the LCA bolts too.

 

Also check the intermediate shaft universal joint. You can see it from the drivers side wheel well.

 

How exactly should I go about checking that? Wiggle it around? Have someone turn the wheel and watch it? And what should I look for?

 

Check it for slop watch t while someone moves the steering back and forth. Grab hold of it and try and move it side to side and up and down.

It should be obvious if it is worn out. Odds are good a 2006 if you're in a salty area is rusted badly.