Rattles

Discussion in 'Modifications & DIY how-to' started by FTZ, Nov 16, 2009.

  1. FTZ

    FTZ ^.^

    Have to start out by thanking pEd and RoMe for their help yesterday. A few months ago, I sound-deadened my car. I went crazy on the door panels, and used a little in the trunk. This helped drastically. It removed most of the rattles I hear when I have the stereo turned up and the bass booming.

    I recently noticed that the only remaining spot that I hear a constant and annoying rattle was my Auto-Dimming Rear View Mirror. I figured out that if I just lightly pinched the top and the bottom with 2 fingers, it would stop the rattle completely.

    Fast forward to yesterday. Over at pEds for my normal weekend car work. I had 2 speakers that were either cutting out or were just completely off, so we popped the door panels to the effected speakers, and sure enough the wiring was loose or completely disconnected. After finishing that up and getting the doors back together, I remembered my Rear View Mirror rattle and mentioned it to pEd.

    He did a quick search and found someone who had the same problem. They posted a DIY on how to fix this cheaply. We popped the mirror off the windshield, and carefully separated the front from the back. I chipped the plastic in a couple of places, but it is minor, and you don't see it unless you specifically look.

    Once the mirror was separated, mixed up some JB Weld and globbed it all around the lip where the two pieces meet. Finally squeeze the two pieces back together, wipe off the excess JB Weld and done.

    On my drive home, I had the music cranked and the windows up (windows up usually makes the rattles more noticeable). I did not hear a single rattle during most of my music. I have a couple of tracks that are extremely bass heavy, and on those tracks, there was a very, very slight rattle.

    Overall, for the 10 minutes of work this took, it was well worth it. For anyone who gets annoyed with the creaks coming from the rear view mirror, I highly suggest taking the short period of time to deaden the mirror.
     
  2. RoMe

    RoMe Active Member

    We should have taken pics for a write up.
     
  3. Alex

    Alex Community Founder Staff Member

    Ive never even heard of this issue, well done.
     
  4. Cool_____

    Cool_____ Banned

    Silicon Gasket maker would probably work better. It'll give a soft cushioning where the JBWeld is still a hard surface and tends to not hold little things that vibrate well.
     
  5. Dr.Chris

    Dr.Chris Member

    I have the same problem. Do you have a link for the writeup? Oh, and the autodim doesn't work too. At least the compass does.
     
  6. FTZ

    FTZ ^.^

    It seems to be holding up so far. It is not the little things inside, but basically where the front of the mirror bezel and back meet. Silicon probably would have been easier, and would have changed the frequency of the rattle to the point where it wouldn't be noticeable.

    If the rattles come back, my next step would be to try Silicone, though I don't know if I can get the mirror apart again now that it is JB Welded together.



    http://www.iwsti.com/forums/how-install/119104-how-stop-rear-view-mirror-rattle.html

    I did not break any of the tabs, amazingly. I did break off a few small chunks of plastic, but when the mirror is in position, you can't see it anyways, so no big deal.

    This weekend I will go over the crack of the mirror where JB Weld can be seen and paint it over with a Sharpie.
     
    Last edited: Nov 19, 2009

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