jmackovic

I purchased a 1998 Transam two weeks ago. It was a lady driven one owner car fax, local trade with only 71,000 miles. Everything was stock and the paint was perfect. I drove 4 hours to get it and drove right into a blizzard. Needless to say I didn't get to drive it and took all the visual cues and the car fax as well as the dealer as support enough to buy the car. I knew buying a 13 year old car would come with some repair issues but this seemed to be pretty well cared for vehicle.

So when I started driving it I noticed a creaking/rattling coming from the front end upon acceleration. Sometimes I can even feel it in the gas pedal.
It also comes through on rough patches of road. I had the differential oil and transmission oil changed right away and asked that the sound be diagnosed and the car fully checked out. During the shop visit they found they needed to replace one of the u-joints and the outer tie rod end. Since the replaced the tie rod they had to do an alignment. During that they found the left drivers side wheel slightly forward of the passenger side. They didn't fix the creaking so I took it back in yesterday. The senior service tech had the car and checked out everything, got everyone else involved and car not figure out where it is coming from. He said the engine mounts are old but look good so he didn't think replacing them would help. He thinks that the car has been driven hard and the frame has been twisted. If I were to go off the appearance and care of the rest of the vehicle I would find that hard to believe but anything is possible.

I guess I have a few questions:
1) Has anyone else had anything like this happen and have you have it fixed?
2) are their suspension upgrades that can be added to stiffen up the from and stop the unibody from flexing if that is indeed the case
3) should I have a body shop do a check on the unibody to see if that is the case?
4) is there something he's overlooked?
5) does anyone know of a shop around cincinnati ohio that specializes in F-bodies?

Thanks in advance for any help you can be!

Joe

babbage1109

iTrader: (11)

Shocks will help ride quality. And subframe connectors will reduce flex.

jmackovic

It doesn't really ride bad and I'm not getting on it at all. I haven't even gone past 1/4 throttle due to the noise. I just picked up the car and when I pulled out it came right through the gas pedal. And the creaking is every time I accelerate. It sounds like something is coming up with the engine and leaving half of itself behind.

sjsingle1

iTrader: (1)

you car is older than mine........and my mounts were total ****.......so i would rethink about replacing mounts

jmackovic

So has anyone had an experience where the unibody did get twisted and if so did it create noises like this or can I just rule that out for now?

Dougaz

funny you say that because i have this creaking/cracking noise too, not super loud but you can hear it from the drivers seat, when i lightly touch the gas it (to me) almost sounds like fiberglass or some kinda of plastic noise. I just picked my car up about 3 weeks ago haven't had time to look under it yet. Its a 2002 with 60k miles. Im doing a bunch of maintenance on it this weekend and if i find the source of this "creaking/cracking" noise i will let you know.

JD_AMG

If the frame is twisted its from being in a accident, not from being "driven hard". And I don't see how slightly accelerating would cause the car to "twist" and make noise, yet it doesn't do it any other time. That makes it sound like its drivetrain or suspension related, not chassis related. Although you had a shop check it out, they certainly could have missed something. Were all the bushings checked? Dry rotting bushing could cause lots of noises - check swaybar D bushings and LCA bushings, these are known for noise.
What about exhaust hitting the body, or having a hanger loose? Its pretty common that the Y-pipe can hit the floor board on these cars, especially with aftermarket exhaust.
Shocks can squeek and make noise, but it doesn't seem to be too common with these cars, regardless the stock decarbon shocks (orange/black ones) are total ****, and should be replaced with a quality shock (like at minimum Bilstiens) - you will notice a drastically better ride quality and stability and wonder why you didn't do it sooner.

jmackovic

Thanks guys. I'm going to take it to a local speed shop. One of the other forums even gave me one of the guys names there and said he was a wizard with the f body.
Thanks again!