Our 2008 Honda Accord has about 89,000 miles on it. For the last few years, it has been making a creaking/groaning sound at low speeds. Generally between 10-20 miles an hour (so you hear in more in rush hour when you are generally annoyed anyway), only when its hot (due to extensive driving or weather - we live in Texas so its awful in the summer) and it does not correlate to using the brakes. We took it to Honda and they said the “bushings” were worn but not broken so they wouldn’t fix it. Our own shop has replace both front control arms. The right side they did last week and 3 days later the sound is starting up again. Its almost as if they can lube it to fix it temporarily but I’d much rather a permanent fix. My father in law suggested the struts. Any ideas?
It does not have to correlate to using the brakes to be caused by the brakes. The brake pads rub the rotors when you are not toughing them so it could cause a sound that you only hear at low speeds. A light touch of the brakes might not make it go away, but a heavier application should either make it go away or change the sound somehow.
It could also be something caught between the brake shield and the rotor, or the brake shield might be touching the rotor.
Another source of this type of groaning is the spring seat, the spring is moving very slightly against the seat and making this sound, although there should be some correlation with braking and acceleration as that tends to move the front end up and down more.
Did you ever figure out a fix for this? You describe the problem perfectly. I have a 2008 Honda Accord as well, and I’ve had this issue for years. Mine now has 134,000 miles on it. Every time I’ve taken it in to get it looked at for this problem, the shop is unable to recreate it, probably because the car is not warm enough yet. The only reply you have to this post is completely clueless. These “solutions” have nothing to do with the sound that we are experiencing.