Front damper bolt removal?

[ExpandWeiner]

Hi, I have a mysterious knocking noise over small bumps that's driving me up a wall.
I've noticed that the front left side damper washer sits quite close to the edge of the strut tower hole and I'm suspecting that it may be the source of my noise. So I'm thinking about removing this bolt in the center and it's washer below temporarily to potentially rule it out as the source. Those would be parts 18 and 6 in the diagram.
Will this be a nightmare to put back?

 

[mlkehunt]

nah the strut mount is held in place by the weight of the car and nothing below it can squeeze past it unless the bottom bushing is totally crumbled. in which case you need it out anyway
you'll be fine, just don't lift the car

 

[ExpandWeiner]

Just to update this thread, I did remove the nut without much of a struggle and decided to drive around slowly to see if it made a difference. Two minutes later I hear a POP from under the bonnet and look to see that the metal collar has ejected itself from the strut tower so the damper rod jammed itself against the hole. Needless to say, this made the knocking even worse lol.
After a short drive back to the garage I decided to lightly jack up that side of the car and I could now move the damper rod around to get the collar and bushing back into place. I did notice that the bushing was quite deformed in one spot where the weight of the car has been resting, so for fun I decided to flip it 180° when putting it back so it had more cushion with a liberal application of silicone grease. The nut is an M10 self-locking nylon type, so it's good to replace it, but I ended up using blue loctite without issues.
After this, I went for another drive and imagine my surprise when the knocking completely went away. At least now I know that bushing is the problem, will be ordering parts soon.