Weird Clanging Sound

[Blackstone]

Wife is driving 2001 XC and when she parked it she heard a loud clanging noise. Of course she continued driving it later. I checked it and the noise occurs if you turn the steering wheel when it is stationary. When you turn the steering wheel there is a popping sound then it stops then as you turn the wheel it pops again lets go then pops again. I do not want to drive it to do any more damage. According to my wife the sound goes away when dring straight and on a flat road but there are load clunks if you hits a bump or the brakes.

CV joint, steering rack, BG? Help

Any idea's before I get the tow truck? This will be the second tow job in 8 months.

[Blackstone]

I checked and the front driver coil spring has snapped. Any idea how much this one will be? Volvo safety?

[BillAileo]

If you can reproduce the noise at a stand still by turning the steering wheel I doubt very much it would be the BG or CV joint. Have you checked out the condition of the endlinks, ball joints, and front suspension spring seats? Perhaps you could get a better idea pin pointing exactly where the noise is coming from if you had somebody stand outside the car listening while you turn the steering wheel with the car stationary?

[Blackstone]

The driver side spring broke near the base. 115K. Not impressed.

[Blackstone]

I would advise any one with an XC to spend 5 minutes to examine their coil springs. The bottom of my driver side spring is rusted and the paint had flaked off and it broke at the bottom. The passenger side spring is in great shape. From the forum it seems like the drivers side spring is the one that fails? If it is salt related and due to water you would think the passenger spring would go first.

Because of the potential safety problems please check your springs for rust and flaking paint. A failure on the highway could be catastrophic.

I live in an area that does not use allot of salt.

[billr99]

I would advise any one with an XC to spend 5 minutes to examine their coil springs. The bottom of my driver side spring is rusted and the paint had flaked off and it broke at the bottom. The passenger side spring is in great shape. From the forum it seems like the drivers side spring is the one that fails? If it is salt related and due to water you would think the passenger spring would go first.

Because of the potential safety problems please check your springs for rust and flaking paint. A failure on the highway could be catastrophic.

I live in an area that does not use allot of salt.

I've had it happen on both a couple of VWs and a Range Rover I had. We use a bit of salt but after a bit its too cold for that so the MTO just plows. I chalked my broken springs up to the horrible roads in Northern Ontario.

[Aviator]

The potential for broken coils goes for any car on the road....it's a fact of life !!

Dave.

[goldxc70]

The potential for broken coils goes for any car on the road....it's a fact of life !!

Dave.

As Dave says, coil springs do break from time to time. Sometimes the effect is minimal, sometimes way more serious. Personally, I have never seen or heard of catastrophic failure but that's not to say it hasn't happened.

[Aviator]

As Dave says, coil springs do break from time to time. Sometimes the effect is minimal, sometimes way more serious. Personally, I have never seen or heard of catastrophic failure but that's not to say it hasn't happened.

I remember about 15 years ago when I still had a great looking 245, I broke the LF coil bashing my way into my driveway at 11 p.m. one night through about 3 feet of snowplough droppings !! I was working at Canadian Tire at the time and was only 10 minutes from work, so the next morning I drove it in but had this awful scraping from the LF the whole way in; put the car on the hoist and found that the lower part of the coil had broken and then popped out of the lower spring seat of the strut. The scraping was that end of the coil wearing a nice groove into the inner sidewall of the tire !! So it can be a catastrophic experience at times !!

Dave.

[Blessyouboys]

Strange - I rarely hear of coils going in other vehicles.

A co-worker of mine drives a 2004 Audi A4, he broke his rear passenger side coil spring about 2 weeks ago. When he replaced the spring, he found out his drivers side rear spring was cracked and ready to break as well.

Here in New Hampshire the roads are heavily salted.

[Forkster]

Maybe its an European thing? The only replacing of springs in any Honda's or Toyota's is to stiffen or lower them. :D

[Blackstone]

I agree Fork, coil springs should not break. From other posts it seems like the front driver side spring is the one that always breaks so it is adding up to some kind of defect. There is serious corrosion on this spring so I suspect poor quality steel and or a defect in coating the spring. Terrible saftey issue if springs break.

Best to examine your springs.