Front Suspension Creaking

[V70Johnson]

Thanks to all the responders to my prior post regarding the cold weather crack noise coming from the pass. side front window. In fact, I experienced two distinctly different sounds while driving today. The "gunshot" occured yet again, which still leaves me perplexed. Another cracking sound, which was much more subdued, happened sometime later & that noise fits the description of two different dashboard plastics "thermally colliding". I'll keep an eye/ear on both.

As far as my evap. system issue & 0442 code, I was able to clamber underneath the car this morning to discover a once again split "J" hose leading into the charcoal cannister. I've ordered a new one & that should resolve the problem.

OK - on to the current issue. About two weeks ago, the front suspension on the pass. side started "creaking". It happens constantly, whether turning right or left, or simply driving down a "moderately" rough road, or coming to a full stop (recoil). I can bounce the car in the driveway & get the sound to occur. The upper spring seats were replaced on both sides in March 10 as well as both swaybar links.

Clueless at this point, but I sure would like to remedy this myself!

[Ozark Lee]

Do you know what brand the spring seats were? If they were ScanTech then they are likely shot again since they seem to last, on the average, around 6 months. Beyond that it may be the strut bearings.

Grab the inverted castle washer(s) and give them a twist - they should move very little. If they pass that test you need to get the car up on jack stands and then push that same inverted caste washer around and look for slop. Anything more than 1 mm or so is to much.

That is another part that should be OEM only. I would rather have a set of bearings out of a junk yard before I would put on new ScanTech parts.

...Lee