[s-cars] Suspension bushings and tranny mounts

[Darin Nederhoff]

C1J1Miller at aol.com wrote:

>Igor: check the torque on the subframe bolts; car on it's wheels.  Especially the front two.  Look for any evidence of the bolts moving under load.
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I second this!   In fact, here is a scary story for everyone.   ;-)

As some of you might recall, I (and a few other listers) have had some
strange front end vibrations at speed on on long right hand sweepers.
I had recently rebuilt the suspension so I was suspecting that my issue
was related to a bent wheel.  Had my wheels checked and rebalanced and
they weren't off by much.  My problem remained.

A week ago today I was to meet up with a fellow list member (Dan Hussey)
for lunch in Prairie du Chien, Wisconsin.  Dan wanted to check out my S4
now that all of the RS2 items are installed, and I wanted to check out
Dan's father's mint 1985 Porsche 928 S.  A win win situation if you ask
me.  Well, my short trip to the gas station prior to departure revealed
an uncomforting shudder in the front suspension at 40 mph.  Hmmm...
 this was new, and not what I needed just before a 130 mile drive.
Remembering that my wheels were recently balanced I thought perhaps they
needed to be re-torqued.  I started with the driver side front corner
and worked my way around the car.  When I put the torque wrench on the
passenger front corner and proceeded to apply pressure I was shocked to
see the entire wheel move fore-aft.  WOW... something was very wrong.  I
didn't have time to investigate right then as I had to hit the road.
 Fire up the 'ol Coupe quattro and I was on my way.

A few days later the temps got up to a comfortable level once again and
I was able to jack the car up a look around.  Initial suspicions had me
thinking the lower control arm was loose at the subframe mount.  I was
right... well, partially.   Digging deeper revealed that ALL of the
bolts the were to be holding the subframe mount to the body were in fact
MISSING.  The driver side bolts were all there but clearly showed
evidence of moving around.  Scary stuff!

The funny thing is that I didn't get around to installing the new front
subframe mounts when I was putting the car back together.  I really wish
I had as I would have caught my problem long ago.

So yes, check those suckers periodically... they might try to escape as
mine did!

Darin


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