RE: I hear you knockin'
There are 3 points of wear in the lower front suspension.
The ball joint at the bottom of the strut, the inner wishbone bushes, and the doughnut bushes at the point where the drag link(is that what it's called?) runs aft to a fastening on the chassis member.
The latter would be my first choice to look at, if the ball joint has been eliminated as the cause. It can be quite hard to detect, because of the forces on the whole system. Jack up the car with the jack under the end of the wishbone, so that the suspension is in its normal compressed state, and then try levering the link backwards and forwards with a crow bar or big screwdriver.
If you jack under the jacking point the suspension hangs taught and play gets masked.
Also try waggling the wheel side to side, and watch or have someone watch the outer track rod end, and the inner ball joint on the rack. Both those can wear and cause knocks, but are replaceable. Finally check for movement in the rack mounts, and play in the rack outer bearings.
Also check the monting rubbers for the anti-roll bar, and the links to the wishbone. Or the telescopic tube or the top mounting or bearing.
A lot of things to go wrong - you just need to work through them systematically, with the suspension in different degrees of compression.
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