I have this same problem. It's because since your bushings are bad they are allowing your axle to move around in a fashion it aint supposed to, so when you hit a bump on the road the axle jiggles around in the play provided by the bad bushings.

If you're gonna replace them, don't go with stock cuz they be rubber and will just rot away again. Get some Energy Suspension poly bushings for it. They sell them in a kit for our trucks and its only about $88 for the kit.

And hope to all that's holy those bolts aren't siezed inside the bushing sleeves. Mine are, and no amount of beating, pneumatic hammering, JB-80, Kroil, and cuss words would get them loose. I'm just waiting on finding some new control arms then I'm gonna take a blue-tip wrench to the old arms and bolts!

 

Tightened up my lower shock mounts with a little over a million ft-lbs of force (cheater bar and pulling for all I'm worth) and, no kidding, it fixed the clunking while going over bumps. Now it feels like my truck isn't falling apart anymore....

 

I had all 4 shocks replaced and its still there. Should I start looking at stuff in the rear end or the tires? Its driving me nuts

 

Did you personally crank the front lower shock mount bolts to a million ft.lbs.? I had to give her all I had with a 1/2" drive and a cheater bar to get rid of the clunk....

 

I did not personally do it but I talked to the mechanic that did and he said he cranked it as hard as he could and got it to 160 ft.lbs. They replaced the driveshaft u joints and the main driveshaft bearing and its still there. It feels like someone is knocking on the floorboard and then I get the awful drone type noise every once in awhile. Are the shocks just not tight enough?

 

Most likely.

Dave

 

How much of the shock stem is sticking out of the nut on the top? You have to swish the rubber bushing pretty good. Also check to see how tight the lower shock bolt is. My low shock nut fell off. I just put on a new nut on and the noise went away.

 

void overtightening the nut on top! If the rubber gets overcompressed, it will usually fail quickly.

Shock noise is almost always on the bottom!!

Dave

 

I'm going to go back to where I had the shocks installed and tell them to tighten the lower bolts as tight as they can and not even worry about what torque they are at. Hopefully that fixes the problem. Thanks for all the help

 

The noise is gone! Turns out when they fixed my front axle seals they did not put enough fluid in it so the passenger side of the axle was dry and grinding itself away. They replaced the worn parts and fluid free of charge and now the noise is gone hopefully for good. Thanks for the ideas