Hello all. Hope everyone is well.

I have a 2002 XKR Coupe with 51,000 miles on it.

When I got the car at 42,000, this noise was un heard of. Around 48,000, this little knock would come into play when running over my driveway. As it progressed, it now sounds like the spring or something in the front creaks and groans when driving, or getting out of the car. Any change in the weight distribution will cause it to make this noise, especially lifting the car with a shop lift. I can even get it to do it with a race jack. Ofcourse, any kind of speed hump or major bump at low speeds will cause the front knock to happen. I have searched everywhere, bought some sway bar bushings a while ago but have not replaced them yet. I am also concerned that driving on this problem for a while may have messed the subframe up if it was the control arm bushings. Thanks for your help.

 

p-ROCK. I too had the driveway clunk. Took a while, but turned out to be the sway bar bushings. I however, did not have the other noises that you have. Best of luck there!

 

Just looked at my upper control arm bushings. There shot on left side, look worn on right side. Im not sure if it ended up screwing up the bolt though.

 

I recently fixed a similar noise on my 03.

Tried the sway bar bushings first since they were easy to DIY. I replaced them with powerflex poly bushing, which actually made the clunk WORSE. I suspect this was because of the slightly firmer connection between the left and right side.

Turns out the problem was the upper shock mounts having dried up and collapsed. There are a couple of indicators for this. One is to pop the strut tower caps off and see if you have dry crumblies in there. The other is to measure the ride height.

Post #2 has the measurements you should see:
https://www.jaguarforums.com/forum/x...pension-74424/

The upper mounts are a common failure at about the age of your car. The front suspension has to be disassembled to replace them so I opted to replace all the bushings and the sway bar end links while it was apart.

Went with Powerflex bushings all around and it's nice and tight now, no clunks or squawks. Has a more confident feel too.

Good luck!

 

I put some PB blaster on the upper control arm bushings, and it made the creaking almost disappear. Just surprised that age did this...since car has only 51k miles on it

 

They are a regular fail item. With rubber components like this, it's age as well as mileage that counts.

Graham