This turned in to quite a long post, so if you are in a hurry, or in a generally bad mood, skip this one for now.
For those willing to listen...
The Story:
About 3 or 4 months ago, I stopped driving my (92, N/A, AWD) Wagon for a week.
There were 3 things going on with it 2 of which I won't bother mentioning for they are irrelevant.
The worst of them was a clunking sound when coming to a stop combined with a wierd jerky feeling when driving... I might describe it as a "lumpy" feeling (a bit hard to describe). The steering wheel and shift knob were shaking too.
It happened fairly suddenly one day after about 10 or 12 minutes of driving, (on my way to work) and again when I was almost home from work that night.
The next day I had to go to work again, so I risked the drive. It did the same thing.. waiting 10 minutes or so to get bad, and again on the way home. This time it was really bad though.
The noise started off as a seemingly mild clunk clunk clunk while slowing down, and when I was almost stopped it seemed to get louder and harder, nearing a "slam" instead of a "clunk".
I waited about a week without driving it until a friend who is much more mechanically inclined (although he's a Mustang guy) could come take a ride around the block with me.
Well, Murphy's law... The problem was GONE when we drove around in it.
The other two problems I quickly addressed when I started drining it again and I was good to go.
...Until Today
It came back today. after 3 or 4 months of driving it the same thing happened today after driving for about 15 minutes. This time I drove it straight to my parents' house (closest place I could go) & did the following:
I removed the front passenger tire, which is the general area where the problem seems to be.
I wiggled everything I could. Nothing seemed wrong... I checked the inner and outer cv boots as best as I could... both seemed fine.
The bushing (or little rubber boot) thingy where the control arm meets the "Back-o-the-wheel area" (Is that the balljoint?) was torn. I'm sure that's no good.
I put the wheel back on, dropped the car back down, and drove it to the gas station... it was fine again... all the way home... fine...
I wish I was a little more auto-mechanically oriented, but I've only just started trying to learn... hopefully I am a good learner.
Sorry for the long-windedness. It seemed to be the only way I could get all the info in there... I hope someone with some knowledge actually reads through all this...(& replies
)
