Front suspension noise

[Allicia8]

I hope somebody can help. About 4 months ago I got new tyres fitted and paid extra to have 4 wheel tracking and alignment. Since then I have noticed an annoying rattle when hitting a bump but to be honest didn't worry too much.

The rattle has turned into a clunk. It actually sounds like the whole front end is loose when I go over a bump and even rattles when the engine does it's 2000rpm vibration thing. I took it to a garage and they put it on a ramp and checked it, saying nothing was wrong. I did say they needed to drive it but they looked at me as if I was an idiot 😡

The car drives fine, brakes fine, steers fine and doesn't drift at all. It passed it's MOT on Tuesday so it can't be anything horrific...can it?

It literally sounds like a tin can of bolts when hitting bumpy road, potholes, drain covers, speed bumps etc.

A little googling found a few posts about IQ models suffering with strut nuts loosening - could this be the case - would these have been loosened when the alignment was done?

Excuse the essay please, I am no mechanic and to be honest, I am not even sure where the struts are but I thought I would ask the group before I pay another garage to tell me nothing is wrong when clearly there is.

[Ch229]

A common thing with the IQs, mine included, is that the nut on the top of the suspension strut, usually the left hand side one, comes loose. It is not a nylock nor does it have a lock washer. Was a simple fix for me. Hope this works for you

[Allicia8]

So I did a bit of investigation and managed to get the dust caps off the strut nuts. I didn't take all the plastic off (need the car later so didn't want to risk not getting it back together) so my view was limited but I got my fingers on the nut on both sides and they didn't feel loose. Both sides seemed in the same place (see photos). Can anybody advise if these look correct.

After a bumpy drive today with the windows down the noise is definitely concentrated on the drivers side.

I know you shouldn't go poking around if you're not sure what you're doing but I am out of spare cash so can't pay anybody to take a look 😞