rear strut wants to be a periscope

[mpvue]

they are tearing up a section of highway near my home. coming home on friday I hit one of the bumps and heard a BANG! I thought it was just a hard hit, so I slowed down a bit, was almost home, and parked the camry wondercar for the weekend.
it was really too hot to go crawling around underneath it looking for something.
went to go to work this morning and only got a few blocks when I realized something was VERY wrong. a look in the rearview showed my driver's side strut trying to poke a hole up through the speaker panel!
I first thought of just driving it that way to work, but then imagined it blowing up right into the rear window. so I turned around and took the mazda5 instead.
I replaced the rear struts and mounting plates recently; either the strut mount is bad and the strut broke right through, or I didn't tighten the 3 little mounting bolts enough (DOH!)

 

[eljefino]

Or you have rust in your chassis! Happens to escorts in the rear and caravans in the front.

 

[NHGUY]

You either have wheelwell rust where the strut mount bolts or the center went out on the mount.The strut rod can pierce thru the center of the rubber mount if the spacer washer was not installed under the mount.

 

[SwampSurvivor]

If you replaced the mounts recently, then all of the supporting structure is gone.

 

[mechtech2]

One of the above^.

Good luck. You have to look at it now. Did you notice horrible rust in the area? I hope it is a mount vs. a rusted out mounting surface!

 

[mpvue]

Originally Posted By: NHGUY
You either have wheelwell rust where the strut mount bolts or the center went out on the mount.The strut rod can pierce thru the center of the rubber mount if the spacer washer was not installed under the mount.

this is what happened. strut blew right through the top of the mount.
no rust at all, looks clean as can be.
as for a spacer washer, IDK if there was one. I just reassembled it like it was but I could have gotten it wrong.

 

[zzyzzx]

We needs pics to better assess the situation. Car is probably trash now.

Obligatory:

 

[mpvue]

Originally Posted By: zzyzzx
We needs pics to better assess the situation. Car is probably trash now.


the pic is blocked here at work so I'm not sure what you wanted to do there, but regardless, the car is 19 yrs old w/ 287K miles. it already WAS trash.
I'm just going to have new strut mounts put in.

 

[mpvue]

its all fixed now; had my mechanic order a new mount and install. hopefully the other one holds up.

 

[mpvue]

Originally Posted By: zzyzzx
We needs pics to better assess the situation. Car is probably trash now.

Obligatory:

hilarious! I can see th epic now at home, it was blocked at work. no, mine wasn't like THAT