2021 Loud front end clunk / bang

Nissan Rogue forum - Includes Nissan Qashqai and Nissan Dualis as well.
cmartyn
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Joined: Thu Oct 28, 2021 3:22 pm
Car: 2021 Nissan Rogue SV AWD

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My 2021 with 1100 miles on it will sometimes go over a pothole and make a loud bang like a shock was broken. Its a loud violent bang. Its done it twice now. I cannot repeat it. It goes over bumps and potholes normally but there seems to be a particular type of pothole that produces this loud violent knock/bang if you hit it just right. Any ideas?


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VStar650CL
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Car: 2013 Nissan Altima 2.5 SL
2004 Nissan Altima 2.5 S

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Erratic clunks like that over 1-wheel obstacles are usually in the sway bar. Have a look at the links on both sides and make sure a nut hasn't backed off. Same for the screws on the bushing retainers, and check the locator rings to see if maybe one of them has slipped. There shouldn't be more than about 1/8" clearance between the bushing and locator ring on either side, more than that will let the bar shift side-to-side under load. Any of those can cause pretty horrendous intermittent noises.

cmartyn
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Joined: Thu Oct 28, 2021 3:22 pm
Car: 2021 Nissan Rogue SV AWD

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Thsnks. I was just looking at them. I will go over them in more detail but these are the cheapest a** sway bar links I have ever seen. The bushings don't have great fittings... they don't even have housings at all. Just like an old bar with a fat rubber washer.

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VStar650CL
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The links are usually spring-tempered to keep the strength up and the weight down, so lots of them are flimsy-looking but not really flimsy. Pretty much all modern stock bars just use rubber bushings with half-round clamps, if you want Delrin and stainless steel you have to go aftermarket. The thing to really look out for is slippage of the locator rings, that's the one thing about Nissan bars that frequently annoys me.

cmartyn
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Car: 2021 Nissan Rogue SV AWD

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Looking at the parts diagram. I can't find the locator rings.. shouldn't they be on the inside of the mounting bushings? Its a two piece aluminum clamp or something like that? I have to take the splash shield off to see which I'll get to.

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VStar650CL
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I just had a look at a '21 on the lift and it uses a bent-bar arrangement instead of locator rings, so forget that part. My bad (but glad they changed it).

cmartyn
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Joined: Thu Oct 28, 2021 3:22 pm
Car: 2021 Nissan Rogue SV AWD

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Well thats good. I made sure the rubber was in place and that all the mounts appear to be tight. The links look fine. The bar appears to be centered.. I tried driving over the same pothole today that caused it and nothing. Im imagining something needs to get into a particular state prior to hitting it and then whamo! It has happened once on each side so far. The noise seeming to come from the same side as the pothole.

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VStar650CL
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2004 Nissan Altima 2.5 S

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Well. the sway bar depends on the subframe to generate leverage when it's torsioned, so maybe your subframe is loose or a bushing is bad. That's the next thing I'd check.

cmartyn
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Joined: Thu Oct 28, 2021 3:22 pm
Car: 2021 Nissan Rogue SV AWD

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By subframe you mean the big squareish welded steel structure that the torsion bar is bolted to correct? You would think if that was loose it would make all kinds of noise all the time. It realy seems fine. The two.potholes that triggered the bang were not even that bad. And it was low speed. The first one was barely 5mph. Crazy. Ill get it to the dealer.. Hey maby there is a foglight patch by now.

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VStar650CL
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2004 Nissan Altima 2.5 S

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cmartyn wrote:
Fri Jul 15, 2022 9:28 pm
By subframe you mean the big squareish welded steel structure that the torsion bar is bolted to correct?
Correct. It basically attaches the engine and front drivetrain to the car as a unit, and acts as a leverage point for the control arms and sway bar.
cmartyn wrote:
Fri Jul 15, 2022 9:28 pm
You would think if that was loose it would make all kinds of noise all the time.
Not really. The weight of the car is on it, so unless it's really flopping around, it takes some force to get it to shift position. The sprung components don't generate those sorts of forces in and of themselves simply because they're sprung, and forces from the rotating components exert themselves indirectly via the engine. So torsion on the body is the primary force that can actually load and unload it and cause it to shift. One of the toughest "clunk" cases I ever worked on (a loud, infrequent bang just like yours) turned out to be a rock caught between the body and a subframe back bushing on a gen5 Altima. It seemed to come from the firewall near the driver's feet, and after literally tearing out the dashboard and driving the car around with most of the interior missing looking for loose seams, the evidence fell out in our laps when we dropped the rear bushings on the subframe. In the immortal words of Charlie Brown, "I got a rock." :crazy:

cmartyn
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Joined: Thu Oct 28, 2021 3:22 pm
Car: 2021 Nissan Rogue SV AWD

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Wow.. well.. ill be sure to have a good look when I get all that plastic shielding off. So hot today I'm having none of it.


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