legacycentral bbs

I went off-road on Sunday in the rain and mud and the car
handled and sounded fine. I ended up letting my wife drive
the Legacy for the past few days so I could test out her used
Forester that we just bought and make sure it'll last til all the
new parts come in. Anyway, she's had it since then and I woke
up this morning to take the Legacy since the Forester seems to
have a leaky lower cam seal and I go to turn out of the driveway
and hear this pretty loud creaking. It's only at a left hand turn and
only at low speeds. It's definitely a creak. The car is on Forester
struts and they're...ok. They're a little cushy from over the years,
but they should do. Being that it was 5 in the morning and pitch
black outside and I couldn't have anyone turn the wheel for me so
do you guys have any suggestions on what it could be? I'm hoping it's
not power steering related, but I haven't gotten the chance to check
the boots or anything. Any ideas on how to test and find out what's
causing it? (Can't do anything at the moment. I'm at work)

You think a tie rod end could cause that? The boot was freakin blown
on the outside. By blown I mean gone.

What bushings are on the car (oem or some polys)? My guess would be front sway bar. Also tie rods generally just rattle, I've never seen one creak.

Standard 25 year old front sway bar bushings. They and the
end links astoundingly enough seem to be in good shape.

Me either. I was gonna just lift the whole front end to check
the noise, but I saw that...saw that it needed replaced and
took it off. The new one will be in today so I supposed we'll
see what happens.

Ball joints and tie rod ends can make a creaking sound if they're really worn and no grease is in there (metal on metal).

If the tie rod end boot is completely gone and everything else looks alright, I'd probably start with that. Bushings for the anti-sway bars can squeak, but have a bit of a different sound than ball joints & tie rod ends that are metal.

Yeah, the tie rod end did the trick. Man...it was rough.
The boot was completely gone and the entire thing was
filled with dirt and mud. All's well now, though

Hey, I have a question for you guys. Any of you have experience
with Foresters?