Hey everybody! I have a 95 A6 quattro wagon that started making some horrible rattling noises from the rear suspension today. When I'm driving along it sounds like something loose is rattling in the rear driver's side of the car, like some loose bolts or something. I checked the tool kit, the spare tire, the jack, and everything else that was in the back of the car at the time and found nothing loose. It kinda sounds like it might be coming from the strut tower, but I can't get to it or find it for the life of me. On my last car it was just covered with a little plastic door but of course this car requires a million different things to be removed before I can even see the strut tower. Help?

Basically my understanding is that there is a huge interior panel on the left side of the interior that I need to pull. It has like a billion screws (which I already removed), and that post that the rear seats attach to (can't figure how to get that out - deep socket on the nut or allen wrench first?)... not sure what else.

Sorry for the novel but I'm tired and rambling haha.

 

Well, I was going to delete this and repost it in the A6 forum but looks like I can't do that.

Here is a picture with the piece I can't get off. Basically I can't figure out what is holding the blue arrow end of the piece on and how to remove the red arrow post thing. I'd also like to know if anyone else has had a similar problem (sudden rattling sound from the interior of the car when driving over rough pavement) and if I'm looking in the right place.

Hopefully that makes more sense.

Thanks!

[IMG]local://upfiles/16613/87DAA4AD89774AB5A1D3284DD22B1BF2.jpg[/IMG]

 

stop what your doing,strut mount bolts are accessed from outside at top of strut in wheelwell.to see what the noise is,look at strut while you have a friend push and pull the back of your car up and down

 

strut top mount doesnt rattle but the exhaust shield does

 

that sounds more like it,is why i suggested push pull method cuz i figured it may be lower mount or something else

 

Wow I guess I should have looked at it a little bit more closely haha. I'll go jack the car up and take a look at it. Thanks! BTW I guess it could be something else but I'm 90% sure the noise is coming from inside the car... I'll check it out in a minute though.

 

Well, I was pulling on the car a little by myself and I think I may have figured out the problem. When I grab the driver's side fender and pull up, I can get it to travel up a good 3 or 4 inches, but when I try the passenger's side, I can barely get it to move at all. It doesn't bounce excessively when I push on it but I figured all that extra travel may be an indication of a blown strut. Thoughts?

 

Could be a broken spring or a sway bar link. jack it up and you will find the prob.

 

Well, I found the source of the rattling . . .


Upon closer inspection, here is what I saw.

Um . . . that doesn't look right.

Time for some new struts.



[IMG]local://upfiles/16613/021407A3BD284235ACE621057B741FA5.jpg[/IMG]

[IMG]local://upfiles/16613/7429319666484B1298503DF4E264F2FE.jpg[/IMG]

 

ouch!,glad you found the problem