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Concerned with a noise I am hearing in the front end of my daily driver truck. It's a Nissan Titan 4x4 with over 200k miles.

When starting from a complete stop, I hear a sound almost like a pop or a crack. The "crack" sounds similar to what you'd hear if you had a chunk of gravel stuck in the tread of the tire.No other symptoms at this time.

Ideas???

u joint maybe

If that is torsion bar suspension I would squirt oil on the bar(s) mounting points........after inspecting, of course. I had an 85 Nissan that cracked and groaned when first taking off in the morning. Kinda like I do........oiled her up and all was well in the world again.

Does this have u-joints in the front or CV joints? I had a truck that "Popped" when starting out, I discovered the boot was cracked and it had gravel in it.

Could be CV joint, wheel bearing, ball joints.

Preface by saying I am a piss-poor mechanic but I wondered if it wasn't a cv. I will try and get under it and see if there's a boot busted.

If it is a CV Joint it will usually “pop”, or “crack” during a sharp turn.....pretty much every time! memtb

Wild guess here... Timing chain hitting timing chain cover. This happened on my Frontier at about 115K miles.

Pretty vague complaint. With out any other info check bearings, ball joints, and u-joints in your drive shaft. You said it was front end so that eliminates u-joint.You might also want to check your motor mounts if it pops when you accelerate.

I have had ball joints make that noise.

If it happens when under way and not standing still,it's not in the engine.

The front end cv/u-joints or other points of movement would be where i would look.

Propeller

Sticky brake caliper

I'd be looking at suspension parts, sway bar links control arm bushings, that sort of thing. Also check the driveshaft to the front diff, see if its got a greasable slip joint.

It doesn't have the click sound I've experienced with previous cv joint issues.

It really sounds just like when you run over a piece of gravel stuck in your tire. Just almost a crack or a pop. I am going to try and get the front end up and take a look at the brake and suspension. See if anything is glaringly wrong.

4WD engaged, or not?

This is happening driving around in 2wd right now. Bare and dry roads.

My first thought, coast to a stop and see if it happens.

Not a mechanic, but had a brake dragging once, sometimes, or a click when the pads lifted off the disc when starting off, sometimes.. After rebuilding calipers (twice in case I screwed up the first time - not a mechanic) turned out that the rubber brake hose had deteriorated on the inside and was acting like a poor and intermittent check valve. Looked perfectly fine on the outside.

My only experience with CV joints was when it sounded like I was grinding gravel when rolling.

See if you can duplicate it by bouncing the truck up and down in place may take a couple big guys to get it bouncing enough. If that doesn't duplicate it try using an Open Door to Rock It side to side and see if you can duplicate it if that duplicate sit it's likely in the sway bar system.