Knocking noise on rough road.

[GA Nightmare]

So I've been noticing that on my passenger side, while driving over small popholes that are unavoidable or driving on the back country roads that I hear this knocking noise. Funny thing is that if I lightly hold on the brake while going over rough road, theres not noise. I thought at first it was the caliper not torqued down tight enough. That wasn't it. then I thought maybe I got the wrong size pads from Advance a while back and they were rattling inside the caliper and rotor. That wasn't it. So now i'm wondering if its a strut problem. But by lightly holding the brake I can't see how that cause the noise to go away. It just weird. More annoying than anything. Car still brakes fine, turns fine, not noticeable bobbing in the front end of the car going over railroad tracks or rought road. 1999 GT with 86K miles. No problems noted on the driver side, just passenger. Any thought? When should struts be changed?

[lone_wolf025]

Bounce test it. Go to the corner you think may be bad and bounce it up and down a few times and watch how many times it bounces til it stops. It should be an immediate and large difference between each rebound. Figure after 3 bounces it should be completely stoppped or nearly so.

[MMGT1]

Upper strut bearings are a problem on that car....might want to check that out(my 2-cnts)

[badboy2451]

might want to check the spring itself, i had the same noise and the top of my spring was actually broke; never even noticed either