Toyota Camry banging on bumps

My daughters 2004 Camry is slapping/banging bad on bumps potholes ETC.
It's on the front drivers side only. To try to explain it, it sounds like the strut bolts on top came loose and the plate is banging against the wheel well on a bump.

She's dropping it off for me to try to fix and I'm trying to get ideas of what it could be before she get's here.

I realize it's a tough diagnosis being I don't even have the car here

She said some mechanic told her it's the wheel bearing which I don't believe. If it was a wheel bearing wouldn't I hear grinding while driving and possibly breaking? That didn't happen the one time I drove it

My thinking is the strut assembly or sway bar link which I've watched some video's and seems doable for me.

Is there anything I should be looking at for a possible cause?

It's a 17 year old car with 200K on it so things are going to wear out. Aside from this the car has never given us a bit of trouble and is still worth fixing

 

My father had a 1998 Camry with 350k and he had a the strut plate (in between the strut and mount) go bad several times. It makes the slapping/banging noise you describe. Now that I think of it he had that wear out in several different year Camrys with high mileage…

 

Sway bar link(s) as you mentioned, or the sway bar bushing(s) at the subframe would be the first things I’d look at. Both common trouble areas on high-mile Camry’s in my experience.

Check for a broken coil on the struts too.

I also highly doubt it’s a wheel bearing.