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940 Clunk - Passenger Front

Hello All,

Finally able to say the clunk has been cured!!!! :-)

I had recently replaced the top mounts (incl. bearings), with no change in the noise. In the meantime I picked up a spare passenger side strut housing as a potential long shot solution.

Today I decided to pull the passenger strut assembly and inspect it carefully. This time I removed the two ball joint bolts instead of the nut holding the ball joint in the lower control arm. As soon as I removed the two bolts water started to trickle out, moving the ball joint caused almost 1/2 a cup to pour out. Never seen that before and not a good sign as it meant water was somehow getting into the strut housing from above.

Upon removing the spring I happened to lift the strut assembly by the strut shaft and heard the 'clunk' I've been chasing. I could see the strut shock cartridge moving ever so slightly at the gland nut. Tried to tighten the nut further, not luck, would not budge (these nuts came with the Bilstein shocks). So I removed the gland nut, the shock and reinstalled the gland nut. It would not go down further than before. Pulled it out again and found corrosion on the inside of the strut housing. Wire brushed the hell out of it - no improvement.

Tried the gland nut in my spare strut housing and it would tightened much further down into the housing. Reassembled everything using the spare strut assembly. Also found my NAPA ball joints (2.5 years old / 30K km [20K mi]), were worn, more so on the passenger side. Replaced both sides while I had the car in my garage.

BTW, I believe all 940s (740 / 760 / 960 ??), use that large metal / Neoprene washers on the top of the struts. Make sure yours is there. If mine had been it might have lessened the damage to the hood when the strut shaft punctured the top mount rubber. Previous owner neglected to install the thick metal washer inside the top mount bearing.

I can't for the life of me figure out how I missed the gland nut issue when I replaced the front shocks in April of 2019. Means that the KYBs I replaced with the Bilsteins in January this year were fine. Doh!! Feel like a right idiot. :-(

Lesson learned - hope the above saves someone some time and energy.
 
That's such an unusual scenario anyone could have missed it. It may have felt tight when you installed and kept making more and more clearance for itself pounding up and down inside the housing. Thanks for posting the answer to the mystery.
 
When I replaced my original struts with the Bilstein Touring struts about a year ago, the gland nuts didn't seem to tighten all the way either. No matter how hard I wrenched on them, there was still a lot of visible thread above the strut tube housing. My old gland nuts wouldn't fit over the new struts so I had to use the new ones. I've got clunking on both sides that really sounds like that is the issue but I've been too lazy to pull it apart again. One day, I'll know the answer.
 
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