I pulled the front wheels off to do the brakes and noticed the boots on my upper ball joints were toast so I went ahead and replaced both upper control arms. I have no lift. I made sure to tighten everything down, but I did it while the vehicle was still on jacks stands. I do not own a torque wrench, so I just made sure they were pretty tight. Now I have a loud clunk/crunch noise coming from the front end that wasn't there before changing the upper control arms. This happens when I go over large bumps or holes in the road. I crawled underneath with it sitting on the wheels to make sure the nuts on the ball joints were tight, and theey are pretty much as tight as I can make them. I may be able to get the bolts in the engine bay tighter through the pockets, but at that point I would basically be deforming the pockets. Any ideas? I did not buy OEM parts, but one of the brands offered at O'Reilly's. They looked pretty much the same as the old ones, and went in with no real issues. Is it possible the parts are defective/different than OEM?
New upper control arms clunking noise
- Thread starter mdshann
- Start date
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The bushings (the bolts that go through the wheel well) should be tightened with the full weight of the vehicle on the ground. Jack it back up, loosen them, then lower it and retighten. You can get a torque wrench at Harbor Freight for like $15 give or take, might not be the one to use for precise engine rebuilding, but way better than guessing for something like this.
That ^^^^^^^^
didn't tighten them correctly
didn't tighten them correctly
On the ground, full weight on them
loosen then up good , bounce front a few times, then retighten
