yeah man i hear ya tahnks for the reply if i had known i was gnna face these problems i would've just swapped out the entire suspension i think it would've saved me all this headache in the long run argh!

 

maybe you have a control arm bushing bolt that isnt quite tightened up all the way. allowing the bushing to move around a bit on the bolt. happened to me when i had new shocks installed.

 

Not sure this will help, but I did have my upper control arm bushings swapped yesterday and 80% of the noise is gone. The only times I get it now, is if I hit a VERY big pothole. Which leads me to believe that the noise itself is NOT coming from the bushings/upper control arms, but rather it is "dependent" on the control arm movement. Meaning, when the bushing is loose/broken/cracked, the noise is amplified because control arm has more play. Unfortunately, I could not locate any contact points anywhere, where this noise could be coming from when the car was up on the lift, so I think I'll just leave it alone for now. If the noise begins to amplify, I'll start looking into modifying the anti-roll bar (there was a thread on this a while back), although this is probably also not the culprit - the noise I'm getting feels like it's coming from right underneath the dashboard, very close to the center. And I did check the upper strut tower braces and they are as tight as they could be - no play at all, that I could detect. I'm beginning to think if this is maybe somehow a frame issue, coming from the cowl itself?

PS I did try to ask my indie whether it could be the strut mounts, but he basically said that it's a very risky and costly job and he's almost certain it will not fix the problem. So, in other words, he said it's just not worth it - particularly, considering that I had new mounts put in less than 6 months ago. I wonder though, is there a way to test the existing mounts and know?

 

Vlad - just curious, how much did the parts and installation cost you for the changing the bushings? I am such a newbie at these things but I am thinking to get them swapped/changed before I hit 80k.

 

Parts were something like ~30 per bushing from Garry Romani, plus bolts - one per side @ ~10 bucks each. The job itself - I'm not sure, because while the car was at the shop, I had several other things done. I had the serpentine belt, tensioner and pulley replaced. Also, had a faulty brake sensor up front, so I had that swapped out. Some error codes read and erased (minor stuff - mostly the errors from the faulty brake sensor). And all this work cost me 200+tax and I tipped the guy another 40. He did spend about 3.5 hours on the car after all said and done, so I thought 200 was miserably cheap. Kinda the beauty about living in NYC area - good mechanics aren't necessarily extremely expensive. I still spent 500+ after all said and done, if you count the parts cost on the belt, tensioner etc etc.

The noise is definitely still there, and it's definitely about 20 times less intrusive, and happens VERY rarely - only if I really hit some bad potholes/bumps. I think the bushing is responsible for most of it, but also, there is something else there. My guess is it's either the dreaded mounts (which by now I'm thinking, unlikely), or some ball joint, that we didn't notice while the car was up. Although, my indie is a real pro and he stands by his work. But in the end, I'm still probably going to have the thing looked at by a BMW tech in a couple of weeks, just to make sure. But again, the noise is pretty much gone - at this point I'm the only one who can even tell there's still anything there, everyone else who's been in my car since the new bushings says they can't hear anything. If I'm REALLY lucky, it's just a matter of some lubrication somewhere, or something minor like that what? It could happen

 

good to hear guys i'm gnna get the bushings looked at as well after the mounts are changed or in the process hopefully i get rid of this man its a big piss off now i dont know if i'm being paranoid or not but hearing some weird noise from the driver side suspension :@ biggest regret man doing this lowering or maybe the shop i chose to lower with hopefully can get all this fixed asap

 

UPDATE: STILL HAVING THIS BS NOISE :@ GOING TMRW TO ANOTHER SHOP TO GET THEM TO DO A CHECK HOPEFULLY THEY CAN HELP ME (fingers crossed) AND IF THEY CAN'T I'M GOING TO SHOOT SOMEONE!!!! lol

 

Keep your pants on, Newbie! We've all been there, and as you become more seasoned in owning this E60, you'll see how seriously frustrating it can be when she's down with something. This is NOTHING compared to some engine knock, or clutch slipping, so don't "jimmy got a gun" all over that Nordic paradise just yet

First of all, what HAVE you done so far?

Secondly, go from cheaper parts to more expensive. First check those bushings, because they cost ONE TENTH of what strut mounts cost.

Third and last. I think what happens is the bushings are more vulnerable because of the lowered, harder-riding suspension. EDIT: just to be clear, these bushings fail all the time on stock non-sport suspensions too, so it's not that the drop is causing them to fail particularly excessively. As these bushings fail, other suspension components will become loose and/or damaged. This is the trade off of driving a sport suspension'ed car. In our case, I think it's the bushings that go and they loosen the upper stabilizer bars - it actually makes sense, because there HAS to be more slack up top to compensate for the increased range of motion in the bottom of the struts after the bushings fail. I'm guessing, the remedy is to replace the bushings and re-torque the upper stabilizer bars, possibly also re-torque the strut mounts.

Maybe you also have some of the ball joints loose - you really have to find a professional mechanic, who you can trust, and have him/her go over the suspension linkage thoroughly. This is what my indie did and found, objectively, only one problem - the bushings. Otherwise, people will take advantage of you, and worse yet, the problem will persevere. I remember when Leo from Motorcepts looked at this issue and told me I needed to replace the mounts, other people told me it could be my steering rack rattling - all kinds of crap, man. Finding an honest mechanic is like finding a politician who honestly cares about the people before anything else.

The residual noise I get is probably from the upper stabilizer bars, which I'm planning to re-torque with some new bolts tomorrow or Saturday. I'll post my results when done - if you want to save some money, wait till I'm done

 

hey guys i got some update in case you wanna check it out and try to fix it ur selves to get rid of it!

the parts that you may need
http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/824/scan1rm.jpg/

the problem explained
http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/412/scanhj.jpg/

 

Hmm interesting ill see if this helps my rattling noise thanks!