Hi,

 

My 87 5spd/r wagon has been grinding for few weeks (since the ea81 swap, did not drive the car prior to buying it, the ea82 was frozen). It has started making popping noises now whenever the front end lifts, such as when under acceleration or on speed bumps. I can also get it to make this noise if I saw the steering wheel back and forth aggressively while moving slowly.

The grinding comes from the front wheels, it is okwhen going straight, but makes a grr,grr, grr noise if I take corners. The speed of this increases and decreases with speed of vehicle, but seems to be much slower than the speed of the wheels.

Any ideas on where to start with these?

well, the first thing you might want to do is jack the car up and support it on a jack stand. shake your wheels from side to side this will detect bad tie-rods and bad wheel bearings. then grab the top and bottom of the tire and do an in and out with the tire, this will detect bad wheel bearings and possible balljoints. then take something to pry with (long piece of wood 2x4, 4x4 or pipe) and put it up against the bottom of your tire and move your tire up and down look at your balljoints while doing so to see if your balljoints have any play in the joint itself. popping could be a balljoint the grinding could be wheel bearings or both. when you have it jacked up take your wheel off and see if you can see any place where it looks like something is grinding metal away.

 

theres a starting point for you to do a self check of front end components.

 

you should always take a look at things to see if there is something obvious happening, sometimes things will show themselve when you jack a car up and do alittle shaking around and pull a tire off.

I didnt see anything obvious under there, there was som play when moving the wheel side to side with my hand. My feeling is bearings but I do not know much about suspension issues.

I appreciate the suggestions.

-Dan

The "popping" you discribed sounds like balljoints to me.. They are normally pertty cheap to replace..

But hard to get out. I use a 5ft bar and lever the hub awat front the swing arm do get mine out. first take the nut off the bottom, and lever. Then put the nut back on loose, take the bolt out that holds the ytop in and lever again. Good to have a helper if you can.

wheel bearings

cv joints

ball joints

tie rod ends

 

might want to get on this quickly too. some of these can be serious safety issues. also wheel bearings will ruin your hub if they get too bad.