vensow

Hi Everyone, sorry for the late reply. Finally I replaced the front struts. Vibration completely gone, zero vibration. Steering felt little tight and breaking improved a lot, no nose dive. But on local roads which are not very smooth, I hear some noise, don't know the right word, clunking something like that. Only noise, drive remained smooth. At high speeds and on highway don't seem to hear, either not happening or not audible. As usual mechanic don't find anything wrong. I am very surprised the how much vibration a worn struts can cause.
One thing I can say is, when everything is in good condition, the ride is superior to any car I have driven so far. Very very smooth shifting and excellent pickup from V8.

Legender

Congrats on getting the problem resolved and thanks for sharing your confirmed resolution with the forum. Continue to enjoy the ride and keep and eye out for those road repairs...

Johnhav430

Well congrats on the new struts....the only thing I can say about the clunk is I have one, and my indie drove the vehicle a couple of laps, and then looked it over good on the lift, and even showed me....he said as a first step, reinstall the factory shims on the front brake pads (I have them but have not installed). He believes the sound I have are the brake pads shifting as there are no shims at all, and the parts are OE done by a GMC dealer who sold me the car. The interesting thing is I can tap the pad pin/tops and it seems to generate a similar clunk or thud. It can't hurt (think about it, everything should be actually a bit loose when in proper shape--my rotors are loose when tires removed but cannot fall out due to calipers/pads)--Toyota put those shims in there for a reason, and they are not cheap either (there are 2 per pad = 8 pieces per axle)....worth a shot.

Gronemus

Which struts did you end up mounting on your car?

vensow

Sure will do that. Thank you.

vensow

@Legender sure will do that. Thank you.
@ johnnav430 , thank you for the info.
@Gronemus - I went with Gabriels. I have spent so many hours researching struts. All the mechanics other than dealer recommended KYB. From my research even though OEM are also same brand but these after market are not same and more stiffer. They intentionally made them stiffer to offset workout springs.
Monroe's also hace mixed response. There is not much info you can find on Gabriels. From my research they came close to OEM but little more stiffer.
Even though I am comfortable and prefer to install with OEM struts I went with Gabriel for following reasons.
1. since I am not sure whether replacing these fix the issue or not.
2. Gabriels are softer and bit stiffer than OEM, I thought it might be ideal choice. I can replace again in 50k miles as they are cheaper.
3. For my VIN number, two struts numbers are listed and dealer is not sure which one to use unless they see the number. To know the right number on existing struts they charge extra if I don't buy from them.
So far I did my best To use only OEM parts. This time I thought of taking chance.

The end result, the ride is not as smooth as before replacing them , but still smootber and little stiffer. I liked how the breaking improved, car is much more stable and steering repsonse also seemed improved.
note that my old ones have 82k miles. Even if I go with new OEM they might also feel stiffer as the time progress they ( OEM/NON-OEM) tend to soften.

Johnhav430

btw if you are interested in the shims, I ended up paying $49 for the fronts, and $40 for the rear on eBay. What I usually do is to watch the items. Then when I see some promo from eBay, like $10 off $50 or something like that, I go ahead and buy....but they are sitting in my basement right now.

Oddly, with the snow this year, I have had a loud groan from the front brakes upon take off from being parked overnight, only once then goes away (returns next time it snows). I don't know if my winter rims are exposed more, maybe allowing slush etc. to build up, not sure...

front
04945-50060
rear
04946-50040

this kinda shows how there are two shims per pad, and which one goes on the inside, and which on the piston...

http://ayu452.blogspot.com/2013/10/m...130-lexus.html