Woah... guess what happened to me!

[Mwindsor82]

For the past two weeks I have been hearing a noise of metal clanking when I hit bumps... I figured it was a sway bar link, and I would fix it when I get to it... been very busy. Saturday the girlfriend and I head to ISU for a party. Car is fine at high speeds and no real noises. We end up leaving at 1:00 in the morning to head back home (2.5 hour drive and we didn't want to deal with sleeping in an overcrowded house)

Driving down I55 I'm hear the noise of some grinding, so I get off at the first exit, it's too late so I check into a super 8... wake up the next morning and take off the front passenger tire, the bolts holding the caliber on are completely gone! an $80 tow to a auto zone 25 miles away (since were in the boonies) and a $8.00 part, the thing is fixed... crazy!

Theres my problem and solution in one post.

[sunrunner_pei]

Goes to show how it pays not to put off/ignore suspension noises. I've had a caliper come loose once before (on my '99), although never lost the bolts completely. Over rough roads the noise was very apparent.

[mattcow]

Wow..8.00 dollars. I had to replace the calliper mounting bracket bolts and it cost me $45 for 2 bolts.

[rixGAphx]

Had that happen to me once, 30 years ago when a local mechanic did the front brakes on my Plymouth Arrow.
He forgot to tighten the right side, and the caliper was dangling by it's hose 6 miles later :eek:

I agree with Matt, that $8 seems too good to be true.

Mwindsor, did you just buy some 'bolts that fit', or did you buy the actual caliper mounting bolts?
Are these the 'slide bolts' that mount the outer 'floating' portion of the caliper to the inner fixed portion, or the bolts that mount the fixed portion to the steering knuckle?

Caliper mounting bolts are made of the finest steel to be found anywhere on a GA, since they are so critical and have no redundancy.
Plain old steel bolts do not make adequate long-term substitutes.
Make sure you got the right quality.

[Mwindsor82]

Had that happen to me once, 30 years ago when a local mechanic did the front brakes on my Plymouth Arrow.
He forgot to tighten the right side, and the caliper was dangling by it's hose 6 miles later :eek:

I agree with Matt, that $8 seems too good to be true.

Mwindsor, did you just buy some 'bolts that fit', or did you buy the actual caliper mounting bolts?
Are these the 'slide bolts' that mount the outer 'floating' portion of the caliper to the inner fixed portion, or the bolts that mount the fixed portion to the steering knuckle?

Caliper mounting bolts are made of the finest steel to be found anywhere on a GA, since they are so critical and have no redundancy.
Plain old steel bolts do not make adequate long-term substitutes.
Make sure you got the right quality.

These are the actual bolts for for the car,even came with the peice that it fits inside of, but I didn't need it

[Nighthawk243]

Yeah, any clunking should be treated seriously.

The one time my GA was clunking, it turned out that the back portion of the driver side control arm was broken. The control arm was basically held on with only the front part. Had I let that go, I would've probably lost the entire LF suspension and wheel on the highway.