2017 Fusion; suspension repair; drives MUCH better

dnewton3

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Joined
May 14, 2007
Messages
11,376
Location
Indianapolis, IN
I make it a point to drive my wife's car every once in a while, because other than catching on fire in front of her, she'd never know if something was "wrong". Case in point ...

The other week, we decide to take her car on a longer drive, which included some highway speeds through construction zones. Upon entering the uneven and rough pavement, the car literally starts "dog-walking" the rear end a tad bit sideways, and the more it hits the bumps/whoops/holes, the more it wants to scoot over. It's not horrendous, but it's noticable for sure, and the longer sections literally require some steering correction. The car feels a bit loosey-goosey. I won't call it dangerous, but it's very unnerving.
- I glace over at wifey as I'm driving and say "Geeeeeezzzz ... how long has it be doing this?"
- "Doing what?"
- (sigh ... ) "Nevermind."

We get home and I immediately put the rear end up on jack stands and pull the wheels.
Left side; wheel bearing is tight and no loose bolts or broken parts I can see.
Right side; bearing is tight, no loose bolts or broken parts, but oil dripping down the shock and there's oil all over the immediate area.
Aha! Blown shock causing some serious compression/rebound issues. Because it's a standard Fusion, parts are in stock everywhere. I get a couple of KYB replacements and have them bolted in within an hour of returning home.

I take the car out for the same drive, and it's like a brand new car. Tight, responsive and no undue movements over the rough stuff.

It's amazing how well even the average modern car drives when things are "right and tight".
 
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Honest question: with your service intervals, how often do you remove the tires and perform a full vehicle inspection?
 
Have you checked out your control arm bushings? I just replaced my front LCA's on my v6 mustang and it was a dramatic difference
 
Dave, your roads up in Indy must be worse than ours! Wife’s 120K+ xB & the newly acquired 165K+ Corolla still have all original struts, ball joints, bushings, etc., and everything is still good!
 
Honest question: with your service intervals, how often do you remove the tires and perform a full vehicle inspection?
I do my own maintenance, so every 10k miles for the OCI and tire rotation.

I suspect she hit a chuckhole hard, and it blew out the RR shock seal. Obviously happened recently in this current OCI or I would have noticed it already myself. It wasn't like that the last time I drove the car; about a month ago.
 
Dave, your roads up in Indy must be worse than ours! Wife’s 120K+ xB & the newly acquired 165K+ Corolla still have all original struts, ball joints, bushings, etc., and everything is still good!
It's all the construction we have around here. The new I-69 extension; the upgrades to I-465; etc ...
The other three shocks were prefectly fine. (I did replace both rears; always in paris front or rear).
 
There's a set of struts, mounts, spring insulators, control arms and shocks headed my way for the Shadow. She's pretty noisy and squirmy in the construction zones and over train tracks. Can't wait to see how much difference it all makes, while managing expectations of the revised k-car suspension I'm riding on.
 
I just replaced the front shocks on my pickup. The left front one was blown out. I never experienced such handling problems like this before. No real excessive bounce or oil leaks with it . I was stumped till I unbolted one side of the shock and worked it. No gas charge was present and the shock totally lost its resistance during compression. The severe body roll (lean) during hard right cornering felt like the truck was going to roll over.
 
I just replaced the front shocks on my pickup. The left front one was blown out. I never experienced such handling problems like this before. No real excessive bounce or oil leaks with it . I was stumped till I unbolted one side of the shock and worked it. No gas charge was present and the shock totally lost its resistance during compression. The severe body roll (lean) during hard right cornering felt like the truck was going to roll over.
For a couple months a few years ago, I noticed that my car was "rolling" a lot in the corners, seemed odd... I chalked it up to being a Camry. During a tire rotation I found a blown swaybar end link! At some point it popped loose, the joint came undone.

I think my prejudice against Toyota is what blinded me to the notion that something was amiss.
 
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