grnaudi96

Hey guys,
I have a 96 A4 quattro, manual tranny. A little while back i notice a slight knocking coming from my front, right wheel well. The weather warmed up a little above 30 degrees last week and the sound went away(I live in North Dakota, so its very cold a lot of the time). Just yeaterday i started hearing the sound again! The temp is back down to ~5 degrees day/ -10 degrees night. I know that a "knocking" sound is a tell tale sign of a bad CV joint or trouble with the axle. I can only hear it while i'm driving straight and turning right amd when i push in the clutch, it goes away! I checked the boot, no holes or grease on the wheel well. Any ideas what might be causeing this? Its only seems to happened when its really cold. Could the grease possibly freeze at these long temps?? Thanks in advance for your help!
Matt

Arson

my guess is its not a CV. Also the driving straight and it knocks thing makes me think not. When my CVs have gone bad I can coast around a corner and still get the knock. Unfortunately I think you are looking at something else, I'm just not sure what.

anarchyjet

Check the AC compressor. When it's cold out and the defroster is used it turns the ac on. If the compressor is bad it makes a nasty noise and it sounds like it is coming from the drive line. Since the rpms drop way down when you push the clutch in, it seems to go away.

grnaudi96

I never thought of that. Should i try to run the ac for a little while? I don't know if it will let me with as cold as it is. I think you might be right though. It didn't do the noise when i came home from work today. Thanks for your help!!