Upper Strut Bushing "bumper"

[nc211]

I was wondering, since it is such a pain in the butt taking out those struts "compressing those springs is a !Removed! of a chore" to get to those upper bumper pieces of the strut, is it worth doing? I guess what I'm trying to figure out, is will replacing these little rubber parts produce a noticeable improvement like the motor mounts do? Mine are not broken or anything, but I do recall they were mushed pretty good, and hard. If they make a big improvement in the smoothness and quietness from road noise, then I'll do it. But if it's just a marginal improvement, then I might wait a while until it is required.

I get a slight jarring noise when I hit a bump in the road, like going through and intersection and the pavement has a bump in it. It doesn't happen on dips, or smooth bumps when the suspension compresses, just when it is a quick shot to the suspension up front. I'm thinking it's those bumpers, or my ball joints "remember, I used that damn fork to seperate them, and mutilated the rubber housing". They've got about 10k miles on them now. I've been told by the mechanic that the mutulated rubber shouldn't affect the balljoint this quickly. Obviously it will speed up the processes of wear and tear, but not in 10k.

So, think it's the upper bumpers? Damn, I wish I had replaced those last year when doing the control arms.. :chairshot: