Hey fellas,
I've got a 94 4runner with 123k miles. When driving around, I notice a "rattling" around the front suspension. I also have rancho 9000's, and on a trip back from Mammoth, I set them to the least possible stiffness, and noticed that the rattling was louder. Has anyone else had this problem? It worries me that I could be driving fine one minute, and doing a nose dive into the ground another.

Thanks.

 

Crawl under there and see if any bolts/nuts are loose...shocks, swaybar end-links, torsion bars, etc. Possibly a bad wheel bearing. Take a look to see what you can see first.

 

My buddies as well as my 94 do the same thing. Think it's something with the CV's.

 

My 94 does this also. To me it seems to be coming from the running board but the CV is probably a better guess. I even had a mechanic go through the front end and all he came up with was it was time to buy new shocks. When I asked if the shock was causing the noise he said "uh, no, but I can buy some and put them in for you for a small price"

 

I hope it's not the CV joints, as I had them both replaced about a year ago. I have gone under there and look/wiggled for anything loose, but have found nothing. Thanks though.

 

Since you noticed an increase in noise while resetting the shock, it's a suspect. Retighten the nuts (make 'em real snug...go easy and see if they move at all) on the shocks. Cheap fix if that works. My Datsun did the same thing when I dropped it...just needed more musle. Good luck.