I have a 2000 with 165K mi. The struts are working fine, no tire wear or bobing over RR Tracks or rode dips...
I am getting rattle noise from the rear suspension, driving over very small road bumps...
Could the rattle be from the mounts or should I get struts all around?
Thanks,
John

 

I would try mounts, unfortunately to change them you have to remove the entire strut assembly with spring, and compress the spring...good time for strut replacement..

 

It could possibly be worn suspension bushings.

 

Which suspension bushings do you have in mind?

 

probably the control arm bushings, do a search on control arms in this forum and you will learn a lot...by the way dont try to do bushings only, you will have to replace entire control arm...also note that the 98 toyota camry control arm is a direct replacement...I know, I replaced them and saved a huge amount of money..

 

Yes, the control arm bushings are the ones I was thinking about.

 

What about in the rear?

 

I have the same question as the OP, and the same problem rattling in the rear. I'm pretty sure it's the mounts, but im considering doing both struts and mount. But when I look at the price with the struts and mounts it's alot of money, but the mounts i can get pretty cheap.

 

Do NOT get cheap mounts! Get OE from the dealer, nothing less. You'll regret it otherwise.

 

OEM mount's are expensive, I can get a pretty good mount for $50. I'll take a look at it anyways, do you have any vender suggestions?

 

AMEN BROTHER!!!!!!!! KYB struts and OEM mounts - you will be glad you did.

 

I've had experience with kyb mounts and yes i agree they suck...

 

While I would agree that one should not buy cheap mounts, or any other parts for that matter, I have aftermarket mounts on my front end and they are good quality and have worked just fine. I frequently buy aftermarket and they can cost less and be of equal or better quality. Just be careful.

 

I tend to agree on the mounts Lexspeed. I prefer OEM over aftermarket, especially on T/L, but then the OEM upper mounts don't seem to have done that well have they? My DIL's Rx has about 150k mi. on it now and the struts still seem to be OK but the upper mounts were in BAD shape at less than 100k mi. I would have expected better than that from T/L, especially when they use such high quality parts on most of the rest of the car. I repaired the upper mounts at 97k mi. because I had literally no opportunity to get new ones before the car left next day for an extended "stay away from home". They have started making a little noise again, but the design is not good, that is what causes the problem. If tested in "real world conditions", rather than factory test conditions, the Japanese would surely have found the weakness.

 

Roger, I think the problem here is that the KYB mounts are the same design as OEM just more cheaply made. I can't say from first hand experience that all aftermarket mounts have the same design, but I believe they do based on pictures I have seen. I agree that the OEM design is flawed but buying aftermarket doesn't fix that problem and gets you more problems.