Question for car people...

[skydiverbry 0]

Gave my 2 cent(a guess at best from this distance.
Now take it to a mechanic,find out what it is,and TELL US WHO WAS RIGHT,
IF ANYONE!!!!
Bry

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Growing old is mandatory.Growing up is optional!!

D.S.#13(Dudeist Skdiver)

[iluvtofly 0]

lol...unfortunately i can't even afford the price for just having it looked at. the noise has stopped...haven't heard it in 1 1/2 days

[Misternatural 0]

if it stopped can I change my vote?

either you're in denial about it or-

......chunk of ice caught somewhere?

[iluvtofly 0]

I'm hoping chunk of ice. It was pretty cold for a while and I was driving on some pretty slushy/icy roads for a few days.

[piratemike 0]

Although it's hard to diagnose with the "single thud" description, my vote is for a worn out CV joint.

The most likely cause would be a broken boot.

Look at the second picture in this link, the tear will be somewhere in the boot.
Likely easy for you to see something like this yourself. Get a flashlight out and look under the front of the car.
http://www.aa1car.com/library/cvjoint2.htm

A way to diagnose that it's a bad CV joint.

Goto a big, empty parking lot. Drive the car in a tight figure eight pattern at 5 mph or so.
You should get some clunking(aka thud) noises while you are making the turns along the outside edge of the fig-8.

If it does turn out to be a bad CV joint, you can safely drive on one of those for long periods of time, they just continue to make more noise.
It wouldn't make the cost much more to repair when you have money and/or when it warms up.

If it was a wheel bearing going bad, those normally make more of a grinding noise, usually when you are driving straight down the road, but sometimes only when you turn.

This could be a break assembly coming undone. If that is what's going on, that can become dangerous.
A loose break assembly will be a problem that will come and go along the journey like you are describing.

Long story short, you should get this in to a shop fast. You need to find out what is wrong.
Make sure you make it clear to the shop that you want them to call you before doing any repair work.
You are just concerned that the car might be approaching unsafe.
Expect $40-$150 for the diagnosis bill.

[JohnDeere 0]

You might need to get someone to look at your rack!!!!!! Rack and pinion that is. That and CV joint would be my 2 first guesses.

Nothing opens like a Deere!

You ignorant fool! Checks are for workers!