I am looking for some help with my 98 a4 Avant. When I drive over small bumps there is a rattle coming from the front drivers side of the car. There is no differance in the way the car handles, like if there was a ball joint or barring issue.
I am very familiar with ball joints, I have replaced all of them 8 in total. As well as barrings 2. The car has 124,390 mi. I rack them up doing around 100 miles a day. A friend told me it could be a loose strut mount, (do audies have struts).
Unrelated. Does any know a good placs to get center caps. I have had no luck at local dealers (with in a good price range)
Thanks

 

The rattle is either tie rod/ tie rod end, bad control arm(s) or loose strut mount.

Check the wreckers (DADS auto, or shoksan) for used parts.

 

Thanks, I will have it checked

 

Could be the strut mount, or it could be that the brake caliper is a little loose. I was having a weird clunking rattle from the passenger side front wheel, and I went to check, tightened the bolts that hold the caliper to the carrier and haven't had the rattle since.

 

I'm having the same problem, and I've had my car back to the shop 3 or 4 times. It started out as a barely audible sound but now it's almost constant. The only difference in my problem is that the sound is silenced when I apply the brakes. Does that help narrow the problem down?

So far I have a small list of tie rod, tie rod end, control arm, and strut mount.