Ok, you guys gave me some things to think about.

However, I think I'm stuck and would appreciate your further thoughts.

Here's what I've done since the last post:

I still have the knocking/rattling sound coming from the front of the car. Tonight, I went out side with the intention of taking the car up to look for the source. However, before I got started, I noticed that the left front was sitting a little lower than the right front. I let the car run for a little while to see if it would level out, but it didn't. I measured from the center of the wheel to the top of the fender lip and found the following measurements:
Left 15 ⅛" (or 384mm)
Right 15 ⅞" (or 403mm)

I thought that the uneven height might have something to do with the rattling, so thought I should do a hard reset of the computer. I disconnected the battery.

I jacked the car up, removed the front wheels, and inspected everything I did when I changed the shocks. Everything looks good and nothing was loose. I can't see anything that would obviously be causing the sound. I reinstalled the wheels and lowered the car.

I held the positive and negative battery cables together for 30 sec and then reconnected everything. I started the car and test drove. The rattle is still there.

I drove for at least 15 min to ensure that the air compressor / tank was full. When I got home, I remeasured the wheel height and found that the unevenness from side to side was almost entirely gone. New measurements were:
Left 15 ¾" (or 400mm)
Right 15 ⅞" (or 403mm)

That seems close enough to me.

The rattling is only on a bumpy road. Once I'm on the main road / highway, I don't hear it. I did notice that when I went over a speed bump, the shock extending (as it comes down the back side of the speed bump) seems really abrupt.

I don't know what to check next. I don't want to have to take it to a shop, but will if I have to.

 

All the plastic shields underneath tight? The large one in the center, can bang on the cross member, if not fastened at all of the retaining points, making some unpleasant noises.

 

Yeah, I checked that. I also tapped all over it to see if I could replicate the sound, but no luck.

I'm really hoping that it is not the new shocks themselves causing the problem.

 

Rattling brand new shocks would be very unusual and bad luck.

I suggest it might be worth ringing the manufacturers and suggest it to them?

 

Well, I spoke with RMT. They are being helpful and trying to help me fix this.

Their first suggestion was to check the nut at the top of the shock. Not the four bolts that secure the shock to the car, but the center one where the CATS sensor plugs in. They said to make sure that this was tight.

I tightened both sides by about a ¼ turn as they already seemed pretty snug to me. I test drove and the rattle is still there.

I called back and they are going to send 2 new shocks. I'm glad that the company is taking care of me, but don't look forward to repeating the 4 hour job that it took me to install them.

I really hope this fixes the problem as I don't know what else to do, short of taking it into the shop, which I've be trying to avoid.

 

I don't know if you replaced the bottom shock bushes, I suppose you must have done with new shocks
I had a rattle over bumps at slow speed and it was the lower shock bushes.
Hard to spot on inspection but replacement of the bushes and it went away. Could it be coming from the back?

 

I just replaced my two front struts with RMT replacements and found them great to deal with. It is difficult to imagine where else the noise might be coming from but the strut particularly as the noise was presumably not there before the swap. Sounds like just bad luck
Steve

 

Paddy,

No, I didn't change any bushes. Can that be done by the home mechanic? I figured that special tools and a press were needed. I think this is beyond my capabilities. If new shocks don't fix it, I'm probably going to have to take it in to a shop.

The sound is definitely coming from the front, but I can't tell which side.

 

New after market, front rear control arms, are what i wound up doing to replace mine. Have not yet figured out how to press the new bushings in yet. Got the old ones out, but new ones want to tilt when i try to press them in. Looks like a real press is needed, as all my methods so far, have not worked out. Was hoping to be able to rig up a device to press those bushings out & in while still on the car, using a bolt with sockets, no luck yet. New arms were about $400, aligned it myself, am still looking into pressing new bushings in but in no hurry now.

 

I'm so F@$%ing frustrated!!!!!

RMT sent me 2 new shocks. Today, I installed the first one (passenger side). Since I'd done it before, it all went smooth and quick. I got the shock installed and everything tightened down to spec. I went to connect the air line and and discovered that this new shock they sent has a different sized brass air coupler.

The brass coupler on the car is too big to go into the smaller opening on the new shock.



I then spent two hours driving all over town trying to find a brass air hose compression fitting. No luck.

Now I'm really stuck. It's Saturday, so I can't call RMT as they are closed on the weekends. I can't drive the car and I'm sure as **** not changing this shock a third time.



Anyone know where I can get the correct fitting?


&#%! @?&# %!@? &#%!@?

 

I found this thread that has some possible answers. Still looking.

https://www.jaguarforums.com/forum/x...-fault-115073/

 

So RMT have changed the size of the brass fitting without telling anyone.

I am sure they can send you two of the correct size male fittings.

It looks a bit involved to change over the females from the 'old' struts.

If they had told you beforehand you could have changed over the females before fitting
the new strut.

 

I just spoke with RMT. They are being very helpful and are very apologetic. They must have rebuilt the shock, using the smaller diameter female fitting that is normally used on the rear shock. They are going to send different sized male fittings, new valves, and an adapter. That way, I can try whichever parts work and send back the bits I don't need.

One thing he did tell me. The rear shocks use the smaller male fitting but also have a thinner diameter air hose. This surprised me. Have any of you found that to be the case?

They're going to overnight the parts, so I should have an update in a couple of days.

 

Front air lines are 6 mm and rears are 4 mm.

It's nice when suppliers respond properly to their mistakes.

 

Ok.....

RMT sent me a bunch of adapters to see what would work. I took a look at all the parts and tried fitting them.

One was a brass coupler that screwed into the smaller female fitting on the top of the shock and then allowed the larger male fitting to screw into that. It worked well, but stuck up so far that the air hose was getting pushed down on by the bonnet when closed. I thought this might cause problems over time.

It looked similar to this:



The other was an adapter that had the smaller male fitting and a length of 4mm air-hose. This then had a plastic push on air fitting that had 4mm on one side and 6mm on the other. This seemed as though it would solve the problem, but it added two more places in the line where air could leak. i.e either side of the plastic connector.

It looked similar to this:



So, after thinking long and hard about it, I decided that the only correct way to fix the problem was to remove the smaller fittings from my newest "replacement" shocks and install the correct fitting taken from the first set of shocks that RMT sent me. This was easy enough to do, but meant that I had to remove the shock from the car (for a third time) to get it done. It was a pain in the ***, but I know its the right way to do it.

With the new shocks installed, I hooked up the CATS sensors and air lines and started the car. After a couple of minutes, it rose to it's correct height.

I took it for a test drive and the rattle is gone. I guess I just got a bad shock.

This was a pain in the *** job, but only because I had to change the shocks three times. Had everything been fine with the first set of replacement shocks, the job would have been fairly simple.

RMT has been good about the whole thing and even overnighted me the adapters. Now, I have to get everything packaged back up tomorrow and take it to FedEx to send the bad shocks back.

 

Glad to hear the good news. ALWAYS FEELS GREAT TO GET IT FIXED. The harder the job the better you feel when it "FINALLY" gets repaired, & works like it is supposed to. KINDA funny how the third time, is how many time's it takes, to get things get fixed the way you want them.