Help! Very nasty braking wobble, clicking in steering, and similar clicking under heavy braking now too.

Kinja'd!!! "Noah - Now with more boost." (antriebverliebt)
10/10/2016 at 11:21 • Filed to: None

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I think it’s a tie rod end. These symptoms plateaued for a couple weeks: just a wobble under 40+ mph braking and a very occasional “click” I felt in the steering. Things have gotten exponentially worse over the past few days, so I’m taking the Q45 off the road until this is fixed. UGH.

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This is the kind of thing I would have investigated ASAP if I wasn’t in the middle of attempting to address a serious driveshaft vibration, which I hoped to dig into this weekend. But it rained . So now I have a nice little list of major issues to address - driveshaft central support bushing, U joint, and now tie rods plus ??? whatever else is broken down there. Long story short, for the third time in the last couple weeks, I find myself deeply exasperated with the budget enthusiast ride lifestyle...

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I hope I don’t have to do the U joint. The vibration is potentially just caused by a worn out central support bushing, which I already ordered.

Sure, one perspective is that this is a total first world problem. Fortunately I live very close to my parents so I’ll be able to dismantle the poor old thing in their driveway, and commute in one of their civics. It isn’t winter yet so working on the car should still be enjoyable. And in theory all of these jobs could be done in one day if my friends help, and all goes well. But we all know that working on cars is never straightforward...

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Purgatory. Anemic, buzzy, loud, uncomfortable purgatory. And it has that nasty, sickly sweet aged cloth interior smell.

So I’m pretty stressed out. Yes, this is part of the lifestyle, but it still blows. This won’t necessarily be that expensive but given that I can’t do any work on the car during the week, and the fact that on the weekend I’m at the mercy of the weather, I’ll be lucky if the Q is back on the road again by the end of the month AKA I will probably be in civic purgatory for weeks.

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The best place ever. It’s especially cozy in the fall/winter with climate control set to the seventies + a little jazz pumping through Bose speakers.

I’ll be saving as much as possible over the next few months so I can move closer to the city... but I have a feeling I’ll keep that up long after I move. I don’t want to play this game anymore and unless I loose my job I really don’t have to. I don’t think I’ll be able to resist pulling the trigger on a new STI if/when I have down payment money + ample savings to cover payments if anything unexpected happens.

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Lapis blue, conservatively lowered on some nice 18s please. With a spoiler delete and that classy WRX trunk lip instead.

Wish me luck Oppo. The parts should be cheap as an amusing number of drivetrain/suspension components on the Q45 are just Nissan Pathfinder parts. I hope everyone is having a better Monday than I am...


DISCUSSION (1)


Kinja'd!!! jimz > Noah - Now with more boost.
10/10/2016 at 11:39

Kinja'd!!!3

yep, once a tie rod or ball joint starts to go, it doesn’t have long.