Creaking, Metal on Metal Suspension Noise while Turning Steering

[edmong]

I've got a 2014 Leon FR 184. I've owned it for a year and over the last 6 months I've had some knocks and creaks from the front suspension.

Did a few checks and decided to replace the front lower arms with the Super Pro bushes ones from Awesome which stopped the knocking.

The creaking while turning is still happening so I replaced the top mounts and bearings from ECS via Awesome. Again, the creaking is still apparent!

I was that annoyed yesterday I didn't wash the car!

Has anyone else had this issue and if so, what was the fix?

It sound like the springs are moving in the mounts and making the metal on metal noise. You can even stand outside and shake the car from side to side to make it do it.

Any assistance would be great.

 

[smutts]

Might be ball joint death, give the wheel a heaving wiggle to feel for play.
If the joint is just noisy, half a millilitre of gear oil injected through the dust boot with a hypodermic syringe will work wonders.
The rubber will seal fine.
But my being diabetic, syringes & needles might be more easy to come by for me.

 

[smutts]

Unless the spring is not seated correctly & dragging on the bodywork unseen up the strut pocket of the inner wing.

Or the track rod end ball joint is moaning.

 

[SuperV8]

I've got a 2014 Leon FR 184. I've owned it for a year and over the last 6 months I've had some knocks and creaks from the front suspension.

Did a few checks and decided to replace the front lower arms with the Super Pro bushes ones from Awesome which stopped the knocking.

The creaking while turning is still happening so I replaced the top mounts and bearings from ECS via Awesome. Again, the creaking is still apparent!

I was that annoyed yesterday I didn't wash the car!

Has anyone else had this issue and if so, what was the fix?

It sound like the springs are moving in the mounts and making the metal on metal noise. You can even stand outside and shake the car from side to side to make it do it.

Any assistance would be great.

Anti-roll bar mounts or anti-roll bar links?

While doing my wheel bearing I couldn't fully undo my anti-roll bar drop link (dumb design - tiny spline drive in the centre not strong enough to hold while you undo the large rusty nut) - which also meant it was difficult to tighten it up again properly! first drive was very noisy and clanging sounding like a loose spring! Had to use mole grips and a hammer to do it up again - when they need replacing I will need to drill them out.

 

[RUM4MO]

When I needed to remove the drop links on my wife’s previous car, a 2002 Polo when it was only 4.5 or 5.5 years old, that one’s original drop links, I seem to remember, had a hex in the centre, so what happened was the typical slipping rotating hex bit opened up the diameter beyond the nuts and that meant these nuts were going nowhere. So lots of chopping off and splitting of nuts required - my initiation into working on VW Group cars! Doing the same job on the late 2009 Ibiza in 2014 was so easy that its drop links got reused with new lock nuts. I still blame Skoda for a lot of these issues as in both cases the “first” or mother car to Polo and Ibiza and so lots of basic bits are made in CZ from might poor quality or just wrong, for that application, steel!

 

[SuperV8]

When I needed to remove the drop links on my wife’s previous car, a 2002 Polo when it was only 4.5 or 5.5 years old, that one’s original drop links, I seem to remember, had a hex in the centre, so what happened was the typical slipping rotating hex bit opened up the diameter beyond the nuts and that meant these nuts were going nowhere. So lots of chopping off and splitting of nuts required - my initiation into working on VW Group cars! Doing the same job on the late 2009 Ibiza in 2014 was so easy that its drop links got reused with new lock nuts. I still blame Skoda for a lot of these issues as in both cases the “first” or mother car to Polo and Ibiza and so lots of basic bits are made in CZ from might poor quality or just wrong, for that application, steel!

With the Leon - and i'm sure all MQB based cars you need to hold the centre with a tiny triple square drive bit - something like 6mm, to undo the large nut, something like an 18mm spanner. Mine undid a few turns before the triple square bit sheared off!

Tried tightening the nut back up as best I could and went for a test drive and the suspension made a right racket - lots of twanging and clunking - so I had to clamp on the tiny thread with my mole grips whilst impacting my spanner to try to shock it tight again - after lots of blood sweat and tears I was about to give up when the nut finally went tight.

 

[RUM4MO]

I seem to remember that all or most aftermarket but good quality versions of that type of drop kink, has a hex section inboard, ie at the link end of the bushes/bearings, that works very well as long as you possess an extremely thin open ended spanner of the correct size. Maybe it was Torx and not Hex on the factory fitted drop links and the opposite on most of the aftermarket ones - same on lots of struts.