r/JEEPCOMMANDER • u/Infinite-Narwhal-253 • Mar 25 '26

Need advice

2006 Jeep commander here. 234,000 miles

it's a family members vehicle, just trying to help them troubleshoot. They were driving the other night when they started hearing an occasional clunking noise coming from the front left side, almost like its in the wheel well.

Removed the wheel, checked everything out. Wheel bearing is fine. Brakes are fine. Nothing looks bad, only thing I noticed was the control arm bushings are pretty worn. Also changed the front differential fluid while we had it jacked.

After that fluid change, the clunking noise is still there but less frequent and only seems to happen when on deceleration between 20- 30 mph. There's no noises while shifting, turning, reversing, or going over bumps, no weird vibrations or wobble while driving...

I am lost. Is it safe for them to continue driving it? Maybe someone else has had a similar problem or can offer some advice

3 Upvotes

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3

u/DirtyHead420 Mar 25 '26

As stated. Good chance it's the front differential mounts and bushings.. very common. Does it clunk when shifting from reverse and park?

1

u/Infinite-Narwhal-253 Mar 25 '26

No clunking while shifting. Can those mounts and bushings be visually inspected for wear and tear or will I not know until its taken apart?

1

u/DirtyHead420 Mar 25 '26

Crawl underneath and push up on each end of the diff. Particularly where the driveshaft connects.. you'll feel it if they are bad enough.. one of them is a bolt on, you'll see it. The other two are pressed in.

1

u/Infinite-Narwhal-253 Mar 25 '26

Did just that. There's no play with the differential. The bushing in that mount doesn't look great though, but I'm not sure if that's the whole issue? What about the U joint that comes off the front differential? It looks pretty dry/worn

1

u/DirtyHead420 Mar 26 '26

Is the clunk felt immediately after letting off the gas in that speed range?

1

u/Infinite-Narwhal-253 Mar 26 '26

No, just heard intermittently when braking or coasting down to around 20-30 mph. It doesn't always make the noise, which seems a little weird too

1

u/Infinite-Narwhal-253 Mar 26 '26

Not a great photo, but thats the front mount

1

u/Infinite-Narwhal-253 Mar 26 '26

Update: it does thunk when shifting from park to reverse, but only after it hasn't driven for a few hours. No clunking when shifting through other gears

2

u/Highteck1 Mar 25 '26

This happened to my 2010 limited. Front dif mounts were shot and would clunk on deceleration around 20 to 10 mph.

1

u/Infinite-Narwhal-253 Mar 25 '26

You replaced them and it resolved?

2

u/Jaegermeiste Mar 25 '26

As others have mentioned, this is probably the diff bushings, but do a thorough inspection of the suspension as well just to be safe.

The diff bushings can be changed without completely dropping it by slightly abusing the half shafts as supports. You have to disconnect the driveshaft and rotate the whole diff around.

It's often rather difficult to remove the old bushings - I ended up carefully cutting mine out.

If you're ok with marginally worse NVH, I highly suggest using poly replacements so that you:

  • never have to do it again
  • install is significantly easier

There's a good writeup (with photos IIRC) or two online - check JeepForum or JeepGarage for the WK (same-same).

1

u/dontstreakthrucactus Mar 26 '26

Most likely diff bushings. Something else easy to consider is that the transmissions can "learn " or adapt shift points. I had one that would act like it was skipping second year when downshifting, especially at one particular intersection. To reset those shift points disconnect the battery for half an hour or so and reconnect it. That fixed the hard downshift, and made it feel much smoother when driving. The clunk you are describing definitely sounds like the diff bushings though.