Hi everyone,
Got a nice question for you :-) VW Passatt, 5 years old with almost 140,000
miles on the clock. Over the last 6 months it`s had a knocking noise coming
from what seems to be the front offside, developing from a quiet noise to a
reasonably loud mechanical clunk, which is now showing up most when
decelerating (not necessarily braking) between 35 and 25mph. The noise also
appears if the car is moving slowly forward and the brakes are applied, it
clunks as the brakes go on.

The brakes have had new disks and pads fitted all round since this problem
started. It`s been into the garage 3 times now to try and figure out what
is wrong, the last time (about 2 months ago) an arm was changed as it seemed
a bit loose, but this didn`t fix the problem.

The car has today passed an MOT, with the examiner being informed of the
problem and asked to have a good look at the front end. The examiner is
known to the garage working on the car, but I trust both of them to do a
good job and tell me when work needs doing. They both know I`d rather know
that something is on the way out and pay to fic it before it becomes an
issue than leave it until it breaks. The garage owner is a friend who
exchanges work on my car for my work on his computer, so he`s not maing
money by having the car in every few months to have a look at it. Having
said that he`s very quiet work wise at the moment, so if he was inclined to
try it on now would be his ideal chance, and he isn`t. He`s a good
mechanic, and he`s not the only mechanic I`ve had look at this - got a
second opinion from someone who was as baffled as the first guy :-) )

It`s not the undertray, the car shows the same problem with it removed. The
car handles fine, brakes work as they should, ABS works as it should. It`s
had a whole new wheel on the front off side and the tyre changed on the
front near side (unrelated, just swapping wheels round when buying 2 new
tyres to get the best balance all round).

Any further suggestions on things to check? The advice I`ve had so far is
to leave it to develop, but 10,000 miles in a clunking car is getting
annoying now, as I`m sure you can imagine :-) But other than that, the car
is excellent (and turning the radio up removes the knocking noise too :-) )

Please help me :-)

On Wed, 7 Nov 2007 23:41:36 -0000, "Simon Finnigan"
wrote:

Hi everyone,
Got a nice question for you :-) VW Passatt, 5 years old with almost 140,000
miles on the clock. Over the last 6 months it`s had a knocking noise coming
from what seems to be the front offside, developing from a quiet noise to a
reasonably loud mechanical clunk, which is now showing up most when
decelerating (not necessarily braking) between 35 and 25mph. The noise also
appears if the car is moving slowly forward and the brakes are applied, it
clunks as the brakes go on.

The brakes have had new disks and pads fitted all round since this problem
started. It`s been into the garage 3 times now to try and figure out what
is wrong, the last time (about 2 months ago) an arm was changed as it seemed
a bit loose, but this didn`t fix the problem.



Please help me :-)
Check the shocks and the bearings at the top of them.
Dave

I agree with the Dave that it's probably a front strut, strut mount
or bushing.