My friend called me over for my opinion on why his car had made a bad noise and sat lower after he backed it out of the driveway a few days ago.
The passenger side was up against the curb, but we jacked up the driver's side, which was definitely sitting low, and found a broken coil spring.
I'm not a big fan of Munroe struts, but it's an old car with c. 280,000 km on it, so I ordered a pair of Quick-Struts.
He drove over slowly yesterday evening, and I noticed a strong smell of hot rubber and that the passenger side was also sitting low.
It turned out the front passenger-side coil spring had also broken. I don't know if it was broken before, or whether it broke on the way over.
Unfortunately, the broken spring cut quite a groove into the inner sidewall of the R tire, so the tire is ruined. I'm so glad it didn't let go while he was driving over!
The struts are due to be delivered tomorrow, but I thought I'd get a jump on it by removing one strut.
It went well. Shockingly, the nut came off the stabilizer-bar end link non-destructively.
Annoyingly, I had to remove the cowl to access one of the three top mounting bolts. Thanks, Nissan!
Anyway, here are some photos:
Low rider!
"Sir, we found something."
All three mounting holes are elongated, I guess to allow for camber or caster adjustment. I'll install the new ones similarly.
Where's the 3rd mounting hole?
Found it!
The culprit ...
The passenger side was up against the curb, but we jacked up the driver's side, which was definitely sitting low, and found a broken coil spring.
I'm not a big fan of Munroe struts, but it's an old car with c. 280,000 km on it, so I ordered a pair of Quick-Struts.
He drove over slowly yesterday evening, and I noticed a strong smell of hot rubber and that the passenger side was also sitting low.
It turned out the front passenger-side coil spring had also broken. I don't know if it was broken before, or whether it broke on the way over.
Unfortunately, the broken spring cut quite a groove into the inner sidewall of the R tire, so the tire is ruined. I'm so glad it didn't let go while he was driving over!
The struts are due to be delivered tomorrow, but I thought I'd get a jump on it by removing one strut.
It went well. Shockingly, the nut came off the stabilizer-bar end link non-destructively.
Annoyingly, I had to remove the cowl to access one of the three top mounting bolts. Thanks, Nissan!
Anyway, here are some photos:
Low rider!
"Sir, we found something."
All three mounting holes are elongated, I guess to allow for camber or caster adjustment. I'll install the new ones similarly.
Where's the 3rd mounting hole?
Found it!
The culprit ...
