Dead Drivers Side Strut?, No bounce Options

[krom8]

I just put a new transmission in my car this weekend and finished getting everything back together today. While driving to work tonight I noticed that whenever I hit a noticable bump in the road that the front driver's side seemed to not give. It's hard to explain but the other struts would bounce and little as they normally would but the front driver's side doesn't bounce at all and seems like it follows the bump in the road. The car has had Tein (1"?) lowering springs on it for years. I've heard of bad struts bouncing too much but is it possible for one to become completely dead. I didn't have this problem before putting my new transmission in so there could be multiple issues going on with that side of the car, I would just like some idea of where to start looking at.

[richee3]

Can you push on that corner of the car as if testing the strut and get any bounce at all?

[trdproven]

when a shock goes dead you hear rattling or its crazy bouncing or its leaking. that sounds more like stiffness like a dampening problem. do a bounce test and if you are still not satisfied pull out your shock and test or inspect it.

[Galcobar]

Springs cause bounce. Shocks are properly shock dampeners -- they control the spring action by slowing the bounce, . The bounce test for shocks isn't to see if the car bounces, it's to see if it stops bouncing. A shock which has failed will not control the springs, and allow the car to bounce repeatedly. TRDproven's thought of too much stiffness seems more probable. Springs are much less likely to fail, and if they do you'd notice the car listing to one side.

[trdproven]

whether the car bounces or its stiff will give you an idea either way. a poor shock will make the car bounce like crazy because really its only the spring doing the work at this point. a good shock will have stiff response. again, springs can be jacked up too though. i guess a sure way is to inspect is for leaks or disassemble and see how the shock stem reacts when you push it down, does it go up fast, does it go up very slow, does it stay down? those are some things to check.

This post has been edited by trdproven: Jul 5, 2012 - 6:27 PM

[krom8]

After looking over that side of the car again I saw that the end link on that side for the sway bar was coming apart. I'm sure I did that on accident while putting the transmission in. Anyways, today I put new Moog end links on and the car is as good as new.


Son of a bitch! I just realized there's a how to for end link removal on here, I ended up using a grinder to get the bolt off.

This post has been edited by krom8: Jul 5, 2012 - 10:19 PM

[trdproven]

supposedly MOOG has lifetime warranty but the fronts are not impressive in size or improvement that much from stock, only the warranty is enticing. the rears are a different story, again, sometimes MOOG has the beefier model for both front and rear, or just front, or just rear for certain cars.

This post has been edited by trdproven: Jul 5, 2012 - 11:07 PM