Hahahaaha.. thats awesome..!!

Let us know what you find out...

 

Just called the dealership where I will be dropping my car off on wed night and asked if they have had any other evo in the service bay for the crunching sound. The service rep told me there was an evo that came in for service and turned out to be a shifted front sway bar. I am not sure if that is my case or not, but just another possibility.

 

caymandiver75, at least they FOUND something that was the culprit, and not tell you "its a normal noise"

following up after the call to the 1-800 number complaining:

I am meeting with the so cal rep that goes around to every dealership once a month to "check up" on the dealerships. We are meeting at a dealership (I don't know WHICH one yet) to get this squared away. I will definately let you all know whats going on.

 

Just crawled out from under the car... nothing is loose... still get the "clunk" under bumps with full compression. The rub marks on the sides of the struts bother me. I may take it to the dealer just to have something to ***** about, because you know they won't have anything good to say.

 

OK my mechanic is a pretty bright guy, and a car enthusiast. He ordered the upper pillow ball mount because he noticed it had rotated a bit, and new swaybar end links because they were loose, but he said the reason the suspension is making noises is because the spring itself touches at the ends. He showed me the driver's side spring when he took it off, and where the spring coils around on itself it is gouging itself and rubbing. He said when the suspension was loading and unloading under cornering, it was hitting itself and sliding off & onto itself, making a racket. He simply put pieces of rubber hose between the ends of the springs (both sides) and to my amazment, the suspension is totally quiet. He also said he called RMR and they told him that the mysterious noises seemed to disappear with new springs. I wish I had a camera to take pictures, but the fix looked simple enough. He said he did that same procedure on eclipses that came to him w/ the same noise, and the fix was permanent in that the rubber isn't going to fall out. Only time will tell, but for now problem solved

 

This is some SERIOUSLY good information..


THANK YOU!!!

 

What about all those people that took your cars in? Did all of you get the "normal" explanation? Is it bad for those springs to be rubbing or is it just a noise issue? As long as I know it's normal I can live with it, even though I cringe every time I hear that sound.

 

I can't imagine that this is "normal", right?

I mean, anytime your suspension pieces are hitting each other, I mean that has to be bad, right??

 

The real issue here is that there is definately a problem with the front end. Problem is, has never come out and yes, we need to do something about this. Without this "blessing" most service deptartments don't want to order parts for a "phantom" sound because they don't want their warranty claims to be any higher than they have to be.

As far as I can tell, the only way some of the cars have been fixed is to have them worked on by a major gear head of a mechanic who knows what he/she is talking about and actually cares about fixing the problem. Otherwise the majority of us, including me, have gotten the standard crap "it's normal" song and dance and have to live with a clunking suspension.

That too bad for all of us and 's rep.

 

Agreed. So is it even worth a trip to the dealership? Maybe it's just better to wait around and see if Mitsu does anything about it. As long as the wheel ain't gonna fall off or a tie rod give while driving down the freeway (makes ya a little nervous doesn't it) then we're probably ok.

 

 

No, I don't think the sound is of major concern as to a suspension part falling off. But if we wait around for to do something, we may as well forget about the problem.

I think the best thing to do is to simply not take the standard it's normal answer. Get the mechanic involved. If he doesn't help, go to the service manager and so on.

Does any one know the 800 number for concerns, complaints, etc??

 

machron1,

would you mind do me (and everyone) a favor..

print this photo out...


and ask your mechanic which part he changed/replaced to get
rid of the noise?

Thanks,

 

Very good explanation. I dropped my car off today with this post. Stohlman Mitsu in Tysons Corner has my car and I'll let you all know what the result is for the noise. I also told them about the paint chips on the drivers side door. They were very aware of that, but had no solution except to play with the door. I told them not to do that, but just give me a bottle of touch up. If that turns out ok, I may just go and get the 3m clear guard applied there to prevent any more chips.

 

O.K. I had that clunking noise. It turns out that i was missing the right front sway bar monting bracket. (mounts to the top side of the sub frame and clamps the right side of the bar down very hard to see unless you are under the car with some room to move)
The dealer said it looked like the bracket had never been on the car as there were no witness marks on the bar.