Car creaks when going over rough bumps and into parking lots. Sounds like the spring may be moving around...? Any ideas. it's on a 92 RS

 

When you find out, let me know. My car does the same thing and it's slowly driving me crazy. I'm thinking bushings. This weekend I'm going to take the tire off and soak them as best i can to see if it helps. (Mix ATF and Brake fluid for this sort of thing.)

 

this helps stop old bushings from squeaking? Does it revive them so to speak?

 

Sort of, I won't do anything about wear. I had an old mechanic tell me about it. The brake fluid has an affinity for rubber and a certain degree of lubrication. The added ATF follows the brake fluid where ever it goes and supplies more lubrication.

I'm going to do it the weekend, I'll let you know if it works. On the other hand, if it is a ball joint, replacement is the only option since the factory ones aren't greaseable.

 

Dropped by my friendly local mechanic and they put it on the alignment rack and took a look at it. They said that they were pretty sure that it was inside the shock-a dust seal that is squeaking. I didn't elect to do anything about it just now, I'll probably do it myself later on. BTW he said ATF on bushings is a no-no so i guess i won't do that anymore.

 

Ok, I fixed it today. I took the shock/spring assembly off and sprayed up inside the upper shock part with LPS (silicone) spray. Hit all the bushings good while I was at it. Problem fixed, at least for now.

 

My sway bar to body mount bushings started squeaking real bad on my car. Just something else you may want to look at too. Replacements were like $13.

 

That wasn't an issue with me because I replaced the sway bar bushings last year when I put on the heavier bar and recently greased them to see if they were the squeak-but yes, sway bar bushings can and do squeak.

 

I'll resurrect this thread because I fixed the squeak and boy do I feel stupid. I can't believe that I, all my friends and two mechanics couldn't figure out that one squirt of grease to the passenger side urethane swaybar mount would completely fix the problem. Not only that, but they are the only two grease fittings on the front of the car. It certainly didn't sound like it was coming from there.

 

So I was right.