This afternoon, the front left strut in my car gave off a fairly loud knock when I turned hard left to pull out of a carpark.

I've had a quick look underneath, and everything (steering rack, tie rods, CVs, control arm, sway bar) seems rock solid. The wheel is on tight, as is the brake caliper. The strut, however (a Koni Yellow/King Low SP combo), seems to have shed the top spring insulator; it's worked itself about halfway out.

Is this likely to be causing the knock? The only real reason I can think of is that the spring has extended to full length at some point, and the insulator has moved. The struts are about 20k old.

there should a little hole in the top and bottom spring plates (strut top and bottom), so basically the bits that hold the spring in. make sure they line up.

It sounds likely it's just what you described, the spring has jumped off the rubber seat and hit the steel seat behind that. There's alot of pressure on springs and even though it wouldn't have gone far, a few mm, it may have hit pretty hard.

Ok. The knocking has started to become much more pronounced, and is now also evident in the rear suspension as well.

The front passenger's side strut. This is definitely the one that's knocking - only ever during turns.

http://img190.imageshack.us/img190/1770/imag0022xd.jpg (http://img190.imageshack.us/i/imag0022xd.jpg/)

The rear drivers' side strut. The knock from the rear only occurs during a bump, never when cornering. It's not really easy to see from the photo, but the alignment of the strut top relative to the spring seems to have changed, due to the uneven pressure from the insulator.

URL=http://img839.imageshack.us/i/imag0020d.jpg/]http://img839.imageshack.us/img839/6559/imag0020d.jpg[/URL]

I know I've really answered my own questions, but is there anything else I need to look out for?

hey mate,

i had the same issue not so long ago.

it only occured when turning at slow speeds - turned out to be the bearing plates (strut mounts) found at the top of the strut, between the strut and housing.
Had them replaced and problem solved.

does it knock if you go lock to lock when stationary?

sounds fairly similar to my problem