N_Rob

Hello everyone, I've been a lurker here ever since I bought my 04 E55 last November. An airmatic compressor failure has been my only serious issue, and I'm overall happy with the car. When I bought the car, there was a clicking noise coming from the front suspension at low speed turns. The PPI that I had done at an indy euro shop near the seller noted the problem and said that it was the front control arms. I kept this in the back of my mind, but left repairing them for another time as it wasn't affecting drivability and I had to replace both rear airmatic struts immediately (used this in price negotiations, I knew it had to be done.) Fast forward to last week, I bring the car in to have the rear shocks replaced and had the front control arms done as well while it was in the shop. But the problem persisted, so I turned to this forum. I read on a few threads that it is most likely the ball joints, so I took it back in yesterday and told them to check the ball joints. I picked the car back up today, they said that they are almost positive it's not the ball joints and that they look fine. Is there anything else that could be making this sound or did the shop miss something when inspecting the ball joints? I'm going to try to attach a video of the sound that I took today after getting the car back home. Thanks.

Edit: video is too big to attach, hopefully I don't get banned for linking an outside link. Not to sure on the rules here about that.

jevlar

Difficult to judge sounds when You don't hear them in person but it do sound very much like what I have on mine now.

I did front control arms and lower as well as upper balljoints recently, sound did not change, one balljoint was sloppy as hell.....
So pretty sure one or both inner bushings for lower control arm is the culprit which is nog biggie replacing so I'm gonna do it even though they look fine.

bigjule

I did the ball joints on my 07 e63 and it def didn't sound like that ..

rapidoxidation

Super easy to lift the front end of the car up and try to wiggle the wheels side/side and up/down. That'll show any play in the ball joints.
If you can sneak under the car while someone is turning the steering wheel, you'll be able to isolate what is sticking and releasing with your eyes and by touch. I bet the sound goes away if the steering is turned with the front wheels in the air. I'd pay close attention to the arms that come out of the steering rack.

What does your power steering fluid look like?

StarvingArtist

Both thrust arms and the upper ball joints are pretty short lived. I've got 35 series tires and not great roads here and I get about 40k out of them. I'm at about 45k since the last maintenance up there. I'll do it all at once this time.
I just watched your video, Could that be your tires shifting on the garage floor? They change angle pretty drastically from one side to the other. Does the sound change on coarse pavement?

FunkTron

Ive replaced both front struts, thrust arms, lower ball joints, upper control arms......i still have the same sound
dealer says normal, i do not

Yuille36

Could it possibly be something with the rack & pinion steering?

N_Rob

I'll try this later tonight. For now, I removed a small bit of power steering fluid.

N_Rob

I thought about this because I remember that 911's with rear wheel steering have a similar problem that sounds almost identical to this. However during the PPI (I watched the whole thing), the car was on a four post lift with the front wheels on things that looked and functioned like swivel plates (not too sure what they are called exactly). The point is that the "floor" so to speak that the front wheels were on moved with them. The sound was there while turning the wheels on this, which is how I knew it wasn't tire noise.
Wow! I think whenever dealerships cannot isolate the problem, they just say it's normal LOL. Took my car to Cars and Coffee the other day and talked to another E55 owner about my problem. Said he's never had it and doesn't know what it could be. So, definitely not normal.
Is there an easy way to check if this is the culprit?

rapidoxidation

feel for it with your hands. The noise is clicking, clicking is caused by two things "hitting" each other. You'll feel it when you find the right component.

Yuille36

The easiest way to tell would be to lift the car with someone in the drivers seat turning the steering wheel. With all the weight off of the suspension and turning the wheel, if there was a problem with the rack & pinion steering rack, the driver would feel it in the steering.