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Well a lot of times when you feel something on 1 side its the other thats the issue. However if you are positive the noise is from the front right then you are most likely correct. That said, creaking and bumping when going over rough road and such even at slow speeds is usually 1 of 2 things- bad ball joints or bad sway bar links. The links are fairly easy to see when turning a wheel hard over uts usually a vertical or semi vertical bar with bushings on either end. The bar could be bent or the bushings worn or destroyed. So get under and take a look. If you don’t see or find anything obvious, jack up that side and lift on the tire, push and pull in/out and front to back. Look at the ball joints and listen for noise. Chrck the boots see if they are torn, grease is spilling out etc. And you’ll have your answer.
I haven’t ever come across a vehicle with a sheath on a brake line near a drum or caliper. It might be a factory thing or could be something someone put on there. Does it move at all? Slide up and down or is it fused to the line? If it’s stuck then just take it off with the old line and forget about it. If it moves and you feel you wanna try and reuse it then slide it off once you get the fitting off and out it over the new one. Now as I said if the heat and cold trick with canned air (be sure to hold the can upside down and if possible use the red straw) then best bet is cut the line to get it off.ruining the fitting isn’t the end all be all you can, if you have the tools and enough line left you could re-flare it with a double glare tool AFTER sliding a new nut onto the tube. Youll most likely have to do this with a new piece anyway although some do come with it on there and already flared so uts a matter of screwing it in and connecting to the rubber portion. As for the tool for flare nuts….ive found using a combo of wrenches as well as crow’s feet that work with a ratchet to be helpful. You gotta be sure you are putting pressure straight on though and you are most likely right the damage has already been done so vise grips. Don’t be afraid to crank em down as the fitting is toast.
Ok a couple tricks…well first I HAVE to ask are you using flare nut wrenches or crow’s feet? Because normal creacent wrenches just round off line fittings.
That out the way, a little heat can help ive also tried another trick using canned air. Turn it upside down shake the hell out of it and spray while upside down and it acts to freeze the metal a little bit. Sometimes that works alone or used after using heat. Just be careful wear safety glasses. I live in NH so deal with a lot of the same issues and the question I often ask myself it- will trying to save this rusty line cost me more time and aggravation than just getting it off and replacing with a new one? Seems either way youll have to do a bleed on the system, most go for stainless but really stainless rusts as well just not quite as fast. SO if you can’t get it off, takes too long etc, cut the line so you can get an extractor socket over it, tap it on and itll come off pretty quick. Its a small section of line and if you are replacing the drum cylinder and all that its really is easier to replace the aging lines around it. Just be sure to bleed properly. Did brakes on my brother’s dodge where someone wrenched off most of a bleeder nipple so they just didn’t bother doing that 1. Caused a bubble in the line allowing moisture to collect and it rusted from the inside blew out in my driveway. The nipple was so bad even with extractor sockets and drilling and easy outs, heat all of it, just wouldn’t budge so had to replace the caliper. While I was at it I replaced all of his rear brake lines as well.
If you are really set on trying to save the tired old lines try the heat and freeze trick just b sure to use flare nut wrenches. If it won’t come off that way (even if you are using vise grips at that point) then get a good set of extractor sockets (Amazon about 25 bucks or so) and that WILL get it off.Well we FINALLY seemed to.manage to dig up the culprit!! I mentioned i replaced the purge valve solenoid about 6 years back. Well over the past year I’ve taken the truck in a few different times for this rich issue and each time we found other problems like my cats were plugging up, o2 sensors going bad, leaking injectors etc which would obviously contribute to those codes but never seemed to fix the issue. Now the vent valve was done in January (had em look it up today) I said previously about 6 months ago so a bit longer. But no other evap codes til this newest p0455 large leak. So I let it sit til I brought it back in and we finally uncovered the issue. The purge valve was sticking open. Not all the time as it tested ok on previous checks but this time it had gotten bad enough to show its ugly face and they had me go into the bay to talk to the tech (he is the only 1 who works on my stuff there and he knows me and my vehicles we got a good relationship) and showed me with the smoke machine he had the rest of the evap system closed off and all that tested out just fine but this would stick open. It would close randomly when not supposed to then go back to wide open and that can easily cause a really rich running condition as the unmetered vapor flowing in is at odds with the rest of the readings and the o2 sensors are saying its too much gas. Since it technically didn’t fail it didn’t set its own code like it did before. I got about 50k miles out of it. Got to thinking that even though my LC9 is a flex engine I’ve never run e85, BUT regular gas (and I only ever use top tier rated gas) is still up to 10% ethanol. Gas dont absorb water but alcohol does. And flowing thru there as a vapor that can cause ut to gum up and cause corrosion. Jason confirmed this actually as he pointed out that over the past year he has noticed more and more of these failing on various vehicles. Ive thought about adding some water remover to my gas now n then to try and combat the issue. But gonna out the one on here in a bit and drive her around awhile see how she does. I do appreciate the input Richard it did help!
Ok gotta correct a couple things maybe I didn’t write it properly but I had some misfiring and after the shop did some checking determined that 1 injector was leaking or fails to close did a leak down test, they also checked each of them as they opened and closed and some other stuff so I replaced them all. I DID get rich codes at the time of the misfire if I didn’t say that or forgot I apologize. Now the injectors themselves are denso injectors flow matched all that but really the only thing about it being aftermarket is the screen. Instead of 4 larger holes it has 12 much smaller laser cut holes. And yes I have been inclined to think I should’ve gone with OEM ac Delco injectors from the get, but the rich was there before and after the injectors. The MAF is unfortunately aftermarket, at the time I bought it I was focused on cost, its unbranded and as far as I can tell its putting out proper readings. However in the interest of being thorough the truck goes in tomorrow its on the list to check.
Now though, throughout this entire ordeal, beyond the original misfire, and about 6 years ago the code for the purge valve which I replaced and then 6 months ago the code for the vent valve which also replaced, I’ve never had any accompa Ying codes WITH the rich codes. Leaving it as kind of a crap shoot. Ive been pretty meticulous taking care of this suburban so this has been driving me nuts. This large leak evap code is the first to pop WITH the p0172 and p0175 codes. I AM at the point that once we figure out the evap thing and get that fixed, IF that doesn’t fix the rich condition (and nothing is found wrong with the MAF) then ill go ahead and just put stock OEM injectors back in and set the fuel trims to do a relearn (I do have a launch bidirectional scan tool thats helped a lot).I’ve made an appt with my local shop to do just that as I don’t have a smoke machine. On my list of never ending tools lol. Whats got me is the rich issue had come up long before the evap code. I also had gotten a misfire and that turned out to be an injector so I replaced them all. I went after market denso of course but they were custom. Instead of 4 large holes (i have the lc9 flex) it was 12 smaller holes. Meant to atomize the fuel for a more efficient burn. After the swap at first everything seemed ok for a few hundred miles, the monitors had all come back no pending codes. Then its been reading rich off n on ever since and by off and on its narrowing it down to a reading that is out of norms and replacing the part responsible (ie MAF). As for the EVAP system as I said before the vent valve was done maybe 6 months ago and I did the purge valve solenoid about 6 years ago (that 1 gave me a specific code for failure i remember) and during my troubleshooting I had thought the canister might be the issue, but not being able to test it further I went looking elsewhere and so far pretty much everything else has been replaced in the fuel system except the canister and the pump (which reads perfect down the middle for recommended PSI range). I am REALLY hoping you are right and its to do with the canister. Ive never replaced 1 myself but from what I’ve seen its not too terribly difficult. The way it goes is if I can’t figure something out (and the local shop went thru it as well for the rich codes before even after the new injectors and such and couldn’t find anything obvious as all we had were both banks rich showing) then I bring it to them for diagnosis. If I can fix it then I do. If I can’t I pay them to do it.