Sounds From the Rear: Explained

Thanks Jay for your continued patience with this. Hope everyone had a great Christmas.

Ok, So this is where I'm at. I took it in to the garage and as I said, they removed the rear drivers side wheel. Never lowered the rear trailing arm to look at the bushing, and never removed anything to look at the axel. Just knocked around there a little (think he was struggling getting at the axle. He then put wd40 on the bushing area. He then put the wheel back on and it's driven throughout christmas without any knocking at all. Great! However, it started again yesterday.

I went out this morning and did a series of stopping and starting stops and accels without holding the steering wheel and there was no movement. The car doesn't jump around when doing any of those things. This from my research is one of the main symptoms of bushing failure.

So we have
a loud knocking on accelerating and sometimes decelerating which seems rotational (speeds as I do)
intermittent sound
when ever the car is lifted, the knocking will cease for anywhere between 10 mins and now 5 days.
bad tire wear (which may or may not be related)

I have no jumping or play when sharply stopping from high speed

I live in Weho Cali and have found it very difficult to find a competent car garage. Any suggestions on where and what to do next would be greatly appreciated.

Ok, so I've just posted a vid/sound clip to youtube of the knocking noise.

It's quite difficult to hear as this was on an iPhone with my arm out the window. The sound is actually really loud in the flesh.

oh and milage is 147

The video is listed as private.

Your video is set to private.

ah, ok one tic

ok, should be good now

Sounds like a bad half-shaft to me. Does not sound like a failed RTAB.

The rapid tire wear is most likely due to bad bushings and/or alignment.

sorry, half shaft? Anyway of diagnosing it? Visually or mechanically?

Half-shaft, AKA: axle. And yes, it can be visually inspected. You will need to remove the CV dust boots.

going to pick my car up just now after it spending the day at the garage again.

He's said that he reckons it's not the rtab and it's the axle. Says that the drivers side axles, both front and back have a little play in them. Passenger side has non.

He won't quote me for a reconditioned one as he says that I'll need to replace it in a few months and I'd be wasting my money. 650 plus tax he quoted. oem part and labour.

Don't ever take your car back to that garage if he thinks it has a front axle...

oh really, hilarious.

You do realize, right? An E36 does NOT have front axles. It's a RWD car...

ok so I've collected my car. 650 plus vat for the rear axle to be replaced. He said that he's not certain that it's the cause but it's likely to be. He said that he grabbed the 'bar' and it had movement in it. The passenger side did not. I can't afford a 650 repair currently (christmas!) but he said if left it may damage the diff.

Link for the parts is in thread 223. Parts GEEK $50 How far are you from Irvine?

You can also find them used on Ebay. The A1 Cardone has warranty. There is a couple on there now.

apologies for having to repeat the info. Thanks.

I've got in touch with a seller on ebay and I'll pick myself up one and get it fitted. Ill keep you updated.

I live just off melrose so about an hour away from Irvine

http://www.ebay.com/itm/BMW-328i-4DR...sories&vxp=mtr

This will give you an idea of what you need to do to remove/ replace half shaft.

He put a torx bit in the rotor bolt and it worked...


I usually strip that bolt even when I'm using the right tool...

ok, so slightly lost. This is sorting the bearing right? Not the axle

The video is for a bearing replacement but you have to remove the half shaft to replace the bearing. It was the best I could find that gives you an idea of what is involved if you attempt this yourself. You need to take the nut off and the various bolts from the stub axles. What you want is the part about the nut, brake removal, end link and removing the axle. You can also contact the guy and ask him to ballpark how long it would take to do this work. My thought is that two hours is more than enough. I know I have taken the axles out of my cobra on numerous occasions. The first time it took an hour to do one. Now I can do one in 10 minutes. The bottom line is that it should not be a $600 plus job. Or you can just turn up the volume on the radio.

haha. thank god for my new radio!

Well after it was last lifted a few days ago, it's not made the knocking once. Really confusing as I would have thought both the axle and the rear trailing arm bushing, if failed, would make noise continuously. hmm.

So the radio volumn solution until I get the parts and tools I need wouldn't be detrimental to the health of my lovely bmw?

Great forum!!

I've read through all 10 pages of this thread and kinda have an idea of what I need to check but I need some of your ideas:

1997 328is - 150k miles

-No noise when accelerating/decelerating in a straight line.
-Loud mechanical clunking noise occurs when I'm making a turn either left or right. Usually occurs at low speeds and on 90 degree turns mostly.
-It's usually a double-clunk (not sure how else to describe :-D )
-Will occur if I'm decelerating or accelerating in the turn.
-Noise comes definitely from the rear of the car.

I'll try out the test for the RTABs tonight and will check for the RSMs as well. Could it be the CV joints? What about the rear diff?

Any help/ideas are appreciated.