I've had the sway bar mounting bushings lubricated and the squeaking mostly goes away, but then it comes back within a few days. I just want it to go away permanently. Maybe the techs aren't lubricating them properly? I dunno...

 

OEM sway bar bushings don't need grease, period. Something wrong here. If a dealer put them in then I'd go back to them and complain. If the bushings are too old to complain about then I'd simply replace them and make sure they're oem RUBBER. I know "they're not polyurethane!! ;-)

They need to inspect and clean any build-up on the sway bar underneath the bushings. Maybe the old bushings deteriorated and left some rubber residue on the bar. Simple enough to do.

 

Any updates on this? I have the squeak as well. Gonna be installing new Moog sway bar bushings.

 

It might be the steering column that's rattling. Found a Youtube video showing the incredible amount of parts that make up the powered column. Given there are so many metallic components in there, it wouldn't surprise me if your metallic sound was coming from the column mechanism.

See all the bits here - one might be your culprit.


If it were me, I'd take a rubber mallet and start tapping around the column. But that might be hard because of all the plastic trim being in the way.

 

I have a similar squeak - my '02 UL has a persistent suspension squeaking, only noticeable over bumpy pavement, even very mild rough pavement, but mine might be both front and rear. Occurs only when going over uneven rough pavement. Going straight over a speed bump doesn't seem to cause the squeaking, but if approaching the speed bump not perfectly centered, the cross-axis movement induces the squeaking.

I have always suspected my sway bar bushings, which are not supposed to be greased, but temporarily greasing a suspect item will help narrow down the cause. If you say the squeak stops temporarily after you grease the swaybar bushings, then you've found the problem. The permanent fix is to replace them with OEM bushings, then you're good to go for another 16 years. Front bushing part # 48815-50180, rear bushing 48815-50020. No point replacing with aftermarket if OEM bushings last 16 years. I'll spray some grease into my swaybar bushings when it gets warm enough outside to crawl under the car.

There is also a unique front-end squeak solution at https://www.clublexus.com/forums/ls-...ml#post8133782

 

Sold the car a while ago but just visited the forum and noticed this thread popped up. The squeaking was in fact the sway bar mounting bushings. Even though I thought they were not that old, they were old enough to be worn. Replacing them with new OEM bushings did the trick, along with thoroughly cleaning the sway bar surface where the bushing wraps around it. Greasing it only causes the squeak to appear at a later date; they're designed to be dry and not greased.

 

ancdmd: Any chance you still have the invoice for the bushings? I'm looking for the part number for the 02 UL's rear swaybar bushings, and all that is coming up on the parts catalogs nowadays is the sport bushings, which implies that all 2002s came with the 14mm sport swaybar, or they took the 13mm bar and bushings out of the catalogs.

Other people on this forum with ULs said they upgraded their swaybars to the sport model, which would imply that the factory installed the 13mm non-sport swaybar. The other possibility is that all of these people installed a sport bar and bushings identical to what they removed. This may be plausible because it would be very difficult to eyeball a 1mm size difference - you would need calipers to confirm the size difference.

Therefore, I am unsure whether or not the 2002 UL had a 13mm or a 14mm swaybar installed at the factory, so I am unsure which bushings I need to replace my squeaky bushings installed at the factory 16 years ago.

 

Sorry I don't have any of the invoices, and I have no idea what size the bar was. I can tell you that I don't remember buying any parts for a sport sway bar though. And if I was given the option of standard or sport I would have certainly ordered the bushings for the standard bar.

 

Just to close the loop on this and to aggregate other information on LS430 squeaking:
1) I ordered 2 x front stabilizer bar bushing 48815-50180, and 2 x rear stabilizer bar bushing 48818-50020, from Amayama, snail-mailed from UAE. These are the same ones that the parts catalogues recommend, which means all 2002 models already come with a rear sport (14mm) stabilizer bar, and not the standard 13mm bar. I think the people that "upgraded" just replaced their old bar with a new bar having the exact same measurements.

I tried to DIY the bushings but broke a bolt off one of the rear brackets while going very slow and evenly, so had a shop install the 2 front and 2 rear bushings. These new bushings eliminated the stabilizer bushing squeaking.

2) The heat shields above my mufflers had rusted out, and any bouncing of the car made metallic metal squeaking. I used JB Weld High Heat to cement the heat shields to the bolt studs, 4 studs per side, they are solidly fixed now.

3) My parking brake was squeaky when activated, so I took the rotors off and sprayed the star-wheel mechanism and the springs with white lithium spray grease, rotated the star wheels many turns one way and many turns back to work the grease in, and adjusted them so the parking brake as close to the inside of the rotor as possible without touching - parking brake now holds very tight with high catch, and no more squeaking.

4) My last squeak, I've almost have figured it out 2 years later - it is coming from something directly connected to the engine block. I thought it was the foam underneath of the plastic wiper/intake cowl rubbing against the metal that others have reported here, but after undoing the plastic screw on each side, lifting up the plastic so it doesn't press against the metal, and test driving, windshield cowl wasn't the problem. After rocking the car and wiggling many parts, I've discovered that it is something directly connected to the engine block and somewhere on the lower half of the engine - Lexus dealership determined it was O2 sensor heat shields, and cut them off.

Other info about squeaking:
Muffler shield bracket (different from my muffler shield squeak): https://www.clublexus.com/forums/ls-...-end-link.html
Windshield plastic cowl squeak: https://www.clublexus.com/forums/ls-...e-driving.html

Driveshaft center support bearing and strut mount isolators are also known to be squeaky.

5) Rattles/squeak from top and/or bottom gloveboxes can be fixed by adjusting the torque of the bolts holding them in place and/or using foam tape or other such shims on contact surfaces.

6) I fixed a metallic rattle/clinking many years ago by removing the rusted out clamps holding the heat shields onto the exhaust pipe, and removed the heat shields to prevent the very common rusting through the exhaust pipe via salt accumulation (was too late though, salt accumulation already did its damage and gave me the P0430 code).