Is this normal?

Hood297 · **Posted:** Tue Jan 15, 2008 11:54 pm

Today after I got my LBJ's replaced, an alignment, and speedo recalibrated I noticed a heavy clunk sound when going over rough terrain. It sounds like a big stick hitting the skid plate.

So when I got home I noticed 2 things the passenger side front CV and Al's UCA ball joints. do these both look normal?

renegadekj · **Posted:** Wed Jan 16, 2008 12:10 am

From the grease on your strut assembly i woul dsay your upper A-arms are making contact, unless grease got there some other way? that could be the noise you are hearing over rough terrain also.really doesn't make sense since those are Al's uppers!

Josh

Hood297 · **Posted:** Wed Jan 16, 2008 12:17 am

thats what I thought too. Its the same noise i heard with my old A-Arms, also the grease on the spring makes me think that too.

Could the alignment have brought the top of the steering knuckle closer to the spring so that it makes contact at full droop?

before the alignment there was no UBJ contact at all.

tommudd · **Posted:** Wed Jan 16, 2008 12:25 am

is the boot torn or does it just look that way? Alignment should not if properly done bring the top of the tire in that close ???? Have you had the front suspension maxed out recently?

Jeep4me99 · **Posted:** Wed Jan 16, 2008 12:31 am

well if you had the LBJ replaced they had to let the suspension droop. Maybe they tore the ubj boot on the springs and just greased the crud outta it so you wouldn't notice. As for the CV, that looks a bit odd, but for it to be "sticking out", then entire suspension/break/hub assembly would have to be moved out, but I can double check that in the morning.

tommudd · **Posted:** Wed Jan 16, 2008 12:36 am

after rereading and seeing that THEY installed your lowers then I would say they messed it up , go back right away and have them put it on the rack and look it over good

M&P40 · **Posted:** Wed Jan 16, 2008 12:42 am

that is normal for my jeep. the upper control arm is contacting the strut assembly and squishing the grease out of the boot. there is a clunk when you go to full droop quickly and when offroading it almost sounds like a CV joint issue but it is the contact that is makin the sound. that is why there is a pad on the frankenlift so when it contacts it hits the pad but mine contacts above the pad cause i have jerry rigged a little more lift out of the frankie. hope this puts your mind at ease

kolesy · **Posted:** Wed Jan 16, 2008 9:34 am

I have an older set of Al's arms and the boot does not seal at the top where it cotacts the arm. It just is pressed tight when not fully drooped. Mine look like that all the time from the suspension flexing. The grease squishes out of the boot. I just make sure to regrease them regularly to make sure there is always grease in them. As far as the axle shaft goes, something does not look right. It looks as if the shaft isn't all the way in the diff.

I would take it back to them and explain what it is doing and have them fix the problem because it obviously wsan't there when you took it in to get the work done.

EDIT: It looks like your grease is coming from the bottom of the BJ. They might have torn the boot when they worked on it. If so have them replace them! Obviously there screw up.

wildrussian · **Posted:** Wed Jan 16, 2008 10:10 am

If your half shaft is not in all the way neither is mine. Id like to see somebody elses though to make sure its where it supposed to be.

tjkj2002 · **Posted:** Wed Jan 16, 2008 11:58 am

Well I can't say about the Frankinlifts but my Al's arms do not contact my springs and I'm sitting higher then a Frankinlift.But I have the genII's also.

Jeepjeepster · **Posted:** Wed Jan 16, 2008 12:49 pm

The upper arm is hitting the spring perch for sure, you can see where its hitting and also grease is all over it.

That boot looks like its torn pretty bad.

CV's are normal.

KJ04 · **Posted:** Wed Jan 16, 2008 3:52 pm

Hood,
do you have extended bump stops in the front?
If not, you can order them at Tera Flex 801-713-3314, $16.24 each + shipping, part #001903200.
I just ordered a set today.

raceinfan · **Posted:** Wed Jan 16, 2008 5:32 pm

the shaft assembly is NORMAL

I just had my INNER axel shaft replaced due to worn teeth from the cv angels, which by the way were NOT bad considering some I've seen around here :shock:

the shaft also had a TON of rust built up around the c clip so the CV shaft itself had to be CUT OFF :shock:

& replaced

I was having strange noises & vibes & no one could figure it out but 1 reputable 4x4 shop did, my problem was at speed on the hwy but it's something to consider

Hood297 · **Posted:** Wed Jan 16, 2008 9:06 pm

Well I figured it out. It was not the UCA ball joint contacting the spring. the grease is from when they disconnected the upper ball joint and the arm hit the spring. The UBJ's looked just like this when I got it right out of the garage it was installed in, no highway or offroad time at all.

The boot is not torn, they are less than 3 weeks old, and I checked on that today.

I will be ordering extended bumpstops in the very near future. (BTW how do they mount?).

The problem was simple, after riding around i noticed that it wasn't just over rough terrain, basically it was over any bump in the road. So I thought "sway bar end links?" when i got to school I looked. and took it home this afternoon, tightened one up, and the noise it gone.

Is this normal?

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