2002 altima help

Hi, i have a few concerns about the 2002 altima my brother and i purchased off our parents for univeristy. the first is a rattling sound from the front of the car when the car is idling, anyone know how to fix this? the second problem is the rear suspension is very low to the tires and when people sit in the back is almost touching the tires, with just people in the front, the suspension is very jarring. What would you recommend to highten the rear end and make a smooth ride?? (longer coils, shock absorber.etc..) Thanks

I can't offer any advice for the suspension, other than to have an honest and reliable mechanic take a look at it. With the rattling noise, check to see if putting the transmission into neutral fixes the problem; also, is there any vibration felt through the steering wheel when you hear the rattling noise? If putting the car in neutral helps with the vibration and the rattling noise then you probably need new motor mounts. It's about $400-$500 to replace all 3 of your mounts with parts and labor.

The slouching/poor quality ride in the back is probably from worn out struts/springs (probably struts). This can be a costly repair as they are fairly labour intensive, but they would cause the problems you describe. As those parts wear they will let the back of the car sag. When you load it full of people the suspension doesn't have enough "power" left to hold the car so it sags. These are also the parts that help smoothen out the road, so if they are as worn as you describe the ride quality would deteriorate quite a bit.

As for the rattle. Could be a number of different things. The wifes '01 Altima had a rattle that was caused by the rubber grommet slipping off the metal bar that holdes up the hood! Needless to say I got lucky and it took about 25 seconds to fix.