Second opinion on suspension clunk e500
I have the famous suspension clunk from the rear.
Mine comes from the left rear, a clunk or a thump, when going over minor imperfections and bumps in the road. I have only driven the car with this clunk sound but the car feels a bit loose in the back.
Anyhow i been examining my rear suspension and i have some possible candidates i need opinions about.
First and according to me most likely, the airmatic shock on the left side is dead. When looking at the right side, its all dry and nice with a very low amount of dirt on it. While looking at the left side its all full of dirt which have kind of dried up making me think that the shock started to leak quit some time ago or only leaks in certain positions, thus a lot of dirt have got stuck. The car also sits lower on the rear left compared to the rear right, about 2-4 cm lower than right.
I think its the shock, would you guys buy a arnott replacement or a reman from ebay? Do i have to change both shocks or can i wait for the right to go bad before replacing? Yes?
My other contenders are the bushings for the swaybar, its cracked in a similar matter on both sides. From the hole the swaybar goes through there are one crack on both sides of the swaybar. Can this be the cause?
And last, the bushing where the control arms holding the spring and shock are connected to the body looks tired.
Thoughts?
If you go to Arnott, then you have to replace left and right.
I'd say if you don't know what the sound is from, but your shock is bad, you should replace it anyway. Seems a logical thing to do. You can look at other things further while replacing the shock.
Bushings sometimes need some leverage to see for sure if they are bad or not. Use a bar against a blocked point and move the joint to look for excessive slack.


