'92 Camry Rear Thumping Noise - PLEASE HELP

[ltat]

Hello all. My trustworthy '92 Camry is starting to get the best of me. Everytime I go over a bump in the road, I get a bumping (a fast bump,bump,bump) noise from the rear of the car. This noise happens when either one or both of the rear wheels hits a bump (noise occurs when it is just the right rear wheel, the left rear wheel or both wheels hit a bump). The struts were replaced 50k miles ago and the noise never realy went away. Also, when the car makes this noise (when it hits a bump), it feels as if the rear of the car is not fully in contact w/ the ground .. it feels as if the rear of the car is floating. Can it be something other than the struts? Maybe rear sway bar bushings?

Thanks in advance for your time.

[Sniperdude]

Could be that or you might need new gas shocks.

[DarkMastyr]

endlinks or sway bar bushings

[Mike Gerber]

In addition to checking the swaybar end links and the sway bar bushings, check for movement of the "rear lateral control rods". The back one on each side usually goes bad and causes a noise. Actually, the bushing inside the rod goes, but I don't know of anybody who sells just the bushings. The whole rod must be replaced. Part cost is around $140 each, as this is a dealer only part. You can easily check for this yourself. Jack up the rear of the car and support it safely on jack stands. Now try to move the rear wheels in and out a bit with your hands at 9:00 and 3:00. If you can, you will probably also hear the noise. If one or both rods are bad you will have to replace the rod(s) and then do a 4 wheel alignment.

If you don't feel any movement then your problem may be bad rear upper strut mounts. This is a fairly common problem and has been discussed many times on this forum. Do a search for "strut mounts" and read up. The problem with replacing the mounts is the struts have to come out again and be completely dissambled.

Mike

[MR ED]

should be shocks my friends camry had same problem and we fixed it last week

[camrycoupe95]

You said it.....sway bar bushings. I had the same thing on my 95....very common issue on the Camry.

Try these first because they are so easy to replace and the bushings only cost about about $7.

If it still bangs (which I doubt it will) then go from there from sway bar ends.