schrute's journal

schrute

I've had a buzz/rattle that's been bothering me pretty much since the car was new. At first I thought it was coming from the crossbar in the rear, but to find out for sure I asked the wife to ride back there in the hatch (just for a mile or so, lol) and she found that is was coming from the headliner, just in front of the hatch and just a little to the right of the centerline of the car. She's a good sport, isn't she? No pics of her riding back there, I know my limits.

Today I finally got around to pulling out all the trim to get under the headliner. There's a couple threads already with pics on how to remove all the rear trim so I won't post those pics unless someone asks.

Pulling down the headliner.



This is what it looks like above the headliner at the back rear of the car (just in front of the hatch). A little piece of Dynamt was already here, but it's not doing its job - there's still a rattle up here somewhere.



A little tapping in the area and the rattle is found. This little wire just to the right of the centerline of the car at the rear of the headliner sounds like the culprit. The fastener that attaches it to the roof buzzed pretty good when I tapped on the roof. It was a surpise that the source of the noise that's been bugging me for a while pretty much every time I drove the car was coming from a little wire.



A little Dynamat should solve this problem.



Covered the wire/fastener with the Dynamat.



While I was at it I decided to cover the rest of this wire above the headliner with some Dynamat.



While I was tapping to find the rattle source these fasteners that hold the headliner to the roof were a little buzzy too.



A little electrical tape should make sure these don't rattle either.



While I had the hatch area all apart I did some more tapping and found a rattle in the area below the crossbar. On the left is the amp for the bose system, on the right is the bluetooth module on top with the XM module right below it. The little black thing on top of the BT module is the BT antenna.



The rattle in this area was coming from each side of the bluetooth module where it attaches to its bracket. A little Dynamat to dampen the rattle was applied to each side bracket.



A little more tapping and another rattle was found at the back of the car. There are two of these brackets on the back wall of the hatch area (just behind the spare tire).



Some more Dynamat applied where these brackets attach to the car.



More tapping after the Dynamat was applied and no more rattle.

That was all the rattles I could find in the back of the car by just tapping on stuff. The real test would come on the road. I'm very happy to say that my first drive with everything back together was pretty much rattle free. I still had a faint rattle from somewhere in the back of the car but it's nowhere near as loud as the one that seems to be eliminated above the headliner. It's a relief to have the loud rattle, the one I could hear above the radio, gone. The faint rattle I still have could only be heard with the radio off and me listening intently. I amost always drive with music playing so I doubt the faint rattle I heard will bother me anywhere near as bad. We'll see!

UPDATE: I'm 99% sure that the wire I found in the headlined goes to the XM antenna on the roof. So, if you don't have the Touring package, my rattle is not your rattle and this post won't help you. Don't want to waste anyone's time.

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