Well it's not coming from the back.

With the car running in reverse, if I stop the rotation of the left front wheel and rotate the front wheel position via the front left tire such that the front wheels are pointing all the way to the right, if I go far enough, I get the awful sound in the following video. Anyone have an idea of what that is? It's coming from under the car, not at the wheel. Same thing if I do the opposite direction for the right front wheel. Very hard to exert Force on the tire and film the underside of the car at the same time, so I have not yet pinpointed the source of that noise.

Only one thing seems loose and I will get to that in a second.
Things that appear tight:

• Stabilizer bar brackets
• Stabilizer bar itself, which passes through lower control arms
• Lower control arms where they meet the subframe.
• All 4 subframe mounting bolts.
• Outer tie rod ends
• Inner tie rod ends in as much as I can tell
• Left cv axle no lateral or in and out play. Well the tiniest bit that needs to be there
• All load bearing motor mounts intact
• Power steering rack not loose. Have not observed if there is movement while the wheels are turned
• Struts firmly attached to knuckles, upper mountain nuts secure

I cannot seem to replicate the clunk sound with the vehicle in the air. At least not as of yet. I found the other noise by accident.

The one thing that is loose is the right front wheel hub. Grabbing the tire at 12:00 6:00 and 3 9 respectively both have tremendous play. I can't assess the tie rod and lower ball joint without someone pulling the tire for me because I am an amateur. One of you please send me a large mirror for Christmas.

It seems to me that the right front wheel bearing and therefore the hub need to be replaced, as I do not have access to a press, even though I bought spare bearings 15 years ago for when they became impossible to find. If I can't find the hub I will go that route. It would seem based on the geometry of this suspension that you could have a bad wheel bearing and still have the tie rod and lower ball joints intact, but that's just me. I need someone to pull in the tire while I look at it to figure out what's what.

Can a worn out wheel bearing make that pop clunk noise? Front right wheel with the tires pointing all the way to the left and the noise occurring while getting the tires all the way to the left and moving forward in gear.

The traditional roaring sound is not present.

Thanks.

Here's the nasty video
Well no, here is not the video. My phone takes MP4s and this site only supports up to mp3s. I'll have to convert it.

 

Now that I think of it, the entire hub is moving, then it is moving the end of the CV axle as well. However it is not clear when pulling side to side and top and bottom how much inward and outward movement there is. I should add that the right CV axle looks to be a bit untrue between the joints. Very very slightly. Doesn't affect driving with respect to low speed wobble.

 

I bet that the front hub itself fractured between the bearings. Let me look at how it is setup. I had an Audi that had a hub fail 35+ years ago.

 

My Audi had a similar setup, you can see the one piece outer race and the two separate inner races. My Audi spun on of the inner races and I had to replace both the hub and the bearing. That is what I would look at on your car, you may have also destroyed the knuckle. On my Lincoln the knuckle is aluminum and it seriously deformed in the accident. All the tapers stretched and the knuckle ended up with 2+” of toe out after replacing the bottom ball joint.

 

It sounds to me like you found the issue, derf. I think if I were in your position, I'd replace the whole hub assembly. I was going to ask about the ball joints as I didn't see them on your list at first. But, you covered it thoroughly. I'm pretty sure that if you replace the hub assembly that you'll cure that problem. I'd come help you, but Reatha is having thyroid surgery on Monday and she needs me here. I DO have a large mirror I could send you if you really want it. It's 42" x 32". It came out of one of the bathrooms when I remodeled them a couple of years ago. Just let me know.

 

Okay now I am way confused. I pulled off the tire, rotor and hung the caliper. When I manipulate the hub, it goes nowhere in any direction. I made sure five times before I posted yesterday including putting a socket and wrench on the lug nuts to ensure that the movement I was feeling pulling on the tire was in fact not because the lug nuts were loose. I actually watched, with the tire attached, The hub shifting around the end of the axle. I'll put the tire back on and see if I'm as dumb as I seem to be. Only thing I can think is that the weight of the tire and wheel and The leverage created by pulling way out from the center are strong enough to move the hub. None of the lug nuts were loose when I pulled on the tire yesterday.

 

ok, couldn't have been loose, because my impact had to work a little on each one to loosen them when I took off the wheel.

 

Loosen the axle nut and see how bad it moves. It will probably move a lot if the hub/bearing is bad.

 

I think Andy is on the right track. Have you actually checked the axle nut to see if it has come loose? I'm curious as to what the hell is going on with that car that's making it so difficult to find. I don't recall ever having an issue like this with anything I've ever owned.

 

Okay guys, it was driving me crazy not knowing if the lug nuts were fully torqued to spec after I replaced the blown out tire. I tightened them to spec but maybe they head backed off. I put the tire back on and here's what I found.

Putting my hands opposite each other, there is play in every direction except the 10-4 direction which seems to equate to the CV being aligned with the transmission in a way I don't understand yet. Every other grab and Rock produces motion of the end of the CV with the axle nut on it. I'm very carefully inspected the knuckle. It is cast iron and I can find no cracks. I didn't want to loosen the axle nut until I was 100% certain that when torqued to spec, it wasn't just the wheel rocking on the hub. Regardless of what I find, it seems the hub, since it receives the splines of the CV axle, must either be moving or the wheel bearing in the hub is worn and allowing play. However, if it is just the wheel bearing, I don't understand why there is the 10 4 position that does not rock at all. I can rotate the tire 45°, 90°, whatever, and I get the same result. Is that because the wheel bearing is not rotating with the hub? That sounds completely wrong at face value to me, not having put a lot of thought into it yet.

My wife is supposed to get her Escape back today. It's making a popping sound after the CV replacement by my mechanic. He said something like something is holding the axles down about an inch and is now questioning the struts that I put in which are Monroe quick struts which are specified correctly with respect to the date cut off present.

The loaded knuckles are identical moog units.

I just dropped off my old parts for him to measure against.
I find it annoyingly sad that he's had the vehicle for 2 weeks for warranty replacement of a bad CV but hasn't looked at the popping issue . This was all supposed to be a simple strut swap in the front. This is a cluster **** and an expensive one. At least I'm not the only one having trouble with it.

Self thread Jack over