Left Front Sits In Further Than Right Side And Bumping Noise.

[FordyR31]

Hi guys,

After searching and asking mates who dabble in suspension mods and coming up with nothing I write to you.

The car: HR31 GTS Coupe. Coilovers are fitted and are the only suspension mod. Sway bar, lca's, tie rods etc all factory. This is a weekend and track day car so not a daily.

The problem: I drove the car about two weeks ago and noticed a shudder at around 80km/h. The wheels and tyres have had a balance and allignment since the coilovers went in about 6 months ago.

With the shudder came a bit of a rattle/clunk noise. My initial thought was that maybe a bush has had its day. The shudder was more aggressive than the usual wheels out of balance I have previously experienced and the noise sounded a little solid metal on metal like sound.

What I have done: When I got the car home I noticed that passenger front wheel sits further inside the guard than the drivers side, going on looks the camber seems even still from the allignment. I have looked at previous pics of the car and the wheel affected looks to have sat the same as the drivers side. The camber tops are also uneven. When my mate did the wheel alligment (professionally) he said that the passenger side adjustment had to be moved right in as far as he could, this gave just over 1.5 degrees camber, the old suspension was also like this but could get 2.3 degrees. The drivers side adjustment has hardly moved off center to get the same as the passenger side. I have had the car on stands and inspected all arms/rods/bars and they look straight on both sides. All bushes seem to be in tact. The wheels feel solid and there is no movement when I try to shake them and they both spin for a while when I spin them and let them go.

Has anyone come across this in their car and what was the cause of it? How did they fix it? It's a pain in the arse, I was hoping to do a track day in April but you have to pay when you book and don't want to take the car if something is wrong and lose the money.

Thanks in advance.

[GTSBoy]

Has hit kerb, has elongated holes for lower inner arm bolt. Or bent crossmember (less likely). Or has pushed whole crossmember left-right relative to frame rails. Or some such thing.

[FordyR31]

I'm pretty careful, I haven't even rolled off a kerb or anything kerb like let alone hit anything. It all looked fairly symetrical to me. I will have a suspension workshop take a look when I can.

[AnotherOneEightyDriver]

Ok, I'm the paranoid here but what I do on suspensions I've learned from race car builders. For the bottom, car on the hoist, pass a string/line through the centre of the car front to back. Measure the track to your line on both sides to get a good understanding of how off the suspension mount points are (if off at all).

For the top of the strut, Nissan has on their workshop manuals a series of measurements to be taken of the bonnet. If they have it for the bottom, I've never seen it but it'd be a lot easier.

Knowing both top and bottom allowed the mechanics to push and bent the chassis until things were 'square' as they said.

[FordyR31]

Thanks for the advice. I did read it, just haven't had the car to a hoist yet.

[FordyR31]

Thanks for the advice. I did read it, just haven't had the car to a hoist yet.

[FordyR31]

Thanks for the advice. I did read it, just haven't had the car to a hoist yet.