If you have been reading a thread on this persistent issue of mine, you know that I replaced the front sway bar bushings (actually, tefloned them 1st) THEN the front sway bar because my tech said that at my mileage (130,000) the paint had to be worn or burned off from excessive front end heat and replacing only the bushings would not do it.
$1100 later, still squeaked, creeked - nice.
Again, ONLY when the car was hot - bumber to bumber traffic etc. hit the brakes or small bump - there it was - aggravating as heck.
Wrote the dealer service manager lengthly e-mail about these fruitless efforts.
I had just replaced the control arm bushings because of steering wheel vibration when braking - this after replacing the rotors did not fix THAT problem.
Had the shocks replaced two weeks ago so I KNEW they did not cause the squeaking - what finally fixed this was replacing the control arms.
Done.
Dealer and I are sorting out what I owe them or vice-versa at this point but, if you DO eventually have this problem, it's the control arm replacement that finally fixed it and if you have steering wheel vibration when braking, replace the control arm bushings before any brake job.
Call me the gunea pig.
Oh yeah, and if you have a ticking in your engine - rod bearings, I know about THAT problem as well.
Btw, if your car starts to run like crapola and your friendly SES light indicates carbon buildup - it's the heads - I know about THAT problem too.
But you know what, my two beloved VANOS units are purring - scratch that DIESLING right along.
Was it the "control" arm or the "thrust" arm bushings? The control arm is forward of the thrust arm. There are two arms. Thanks!
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Need4Spd
'01 M5/UUC SSK + Rogue WSR/RE Tranny Mounts+Royal Purple Synchromax/Axxis ULT Pads/StopTech SS Lines/TC Design from BeastPower Anti-roll Bar Brackets/Dinan LtWtFlywheel and Stage 3 suspension/Goodyear F1 Asymmetrics/Vines thrust arms/IATS relocation/10w-60 oil/hardwired Escort 9500i/Euro Armrest/TEC Cupholder/IceLink/PowerChip 91 Gold/TUBIs!/Strong Strut/BSW Stage 1/BT/Angel iBrights 3.0
'05 M3 Imola Cabrio 6MT, Nav, HK
"Is it the sounds that make a BMW a BMW? A BMW is designed to be heard, felt, experienced. So our engines sing. Our steering talks back. And we insist on offering manual transmissions in nearly all our models for drivers who crave them. The result is an almost telepathic oneness with the car. Just as surely as you can hear a BMW, a BMW hears you."
Was it the "control" arm or the "thrust" arm bushings? The control arm is forward of the thrust arm. There are two arms. Thanks!
From other posts it appears that the thrust arm bushings need replacement before 130,000 miles. You are probably going to be on your third set soon unless you switched to a more durable bushing.
130,000 miles is about time for the control arms to need replacing. They are more durable than the thrust arms but they do give up eventually. Note that the recommended procedure is to replace the whole control arm because it includes a ball joint on one end and a bushing on the other. My information is that they should be replaced together, so replace the whole arm on both sides of the car. You should be good for at least another 100,000 miles on control arms!
gsfent and DavidS - here are the two relevant part numbers - I won't give you the nut and clamp etc #'s but here ya go:
31-12-1-141-961 and 962
Whether they are Thrust or Control arms - whatever they are, they fixed this persistent noise completely.
Thanks for posting the part numbers. I will leave it to the experts, but I think this is the lower control arm (BMW calls it wishbone, item #12). I believe the thrust arm is part #5.
Here is the realoem link:
Linear Mode
