I hear this ominous rattling sound coming from the front left(?) of the car... whenever the road is cracked and not perfectly smooth.

I have a tendency to keep low rpm when I drive perhaps too much of a tendency.
Sometimes I keep third even when I am only 1000 rpm (out of laziness? dunno) and I have noticed that there seem to be a relation between this occurrence and the ominous rattling sound. So I switched to neutral but it kept rattling.

A mechanic recently replaced all car shocks and the two wishbones but has no idea what is causing that noise and whether it is related to the new stuff or not.

You can hear it throughout the video in the background but is louder at 0:12, 0:20, 0:31, 0:39, 0:52, 0:57 etc.

Wow, when did we start exporting UK road surfaces to Italy?


The 'clunk' sounds a bit suspension or drive-shaft.


That said, if your wheel nuts are a little bit loose, you'll get the same noise - check that first.

wheel nuts are OK (checked with torque wrench).
What scares me is the mechanic not finding the source... :bang:
This noise is really annoying and it makes me and everyone on board feel like something is wrong with the car.

andy1 said:

wheel nuts are OK (checked with torque wrench).
What scares me is the mechanic not finding the source... :bang:
This noise is really annoying and it makes me and everyone on board feel like something is wrong with the car.

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I think something is wrong with the car and from what you say, wasn't there before it was fixed.


You'll forgive the irony, but your location and predicament has now forced me to render the ancient abbreviation:


Fix
It
Again
Tony

I am not angry at FIAT because I know who the previous owner of this car was, completely oblivious to potholes and such.
Plus if you google "buche Roma" you will find out the rest! Any car would have been in this state now.

Check the anti-roll bar drop links. These wear quickly and will cause a rattle. As the roll bar transmits force to the other side, the right drop link can rattle when the left wheel drops into a hole. Cheap, easy to fix. Wonderfully quiet afterwards. Mine seemed fine until removed, so don't just check them when under tension.

Yes, I am considering that. But it is odd that the noise continues at minute 1.10 on that fine stretch...

I would 2nd drop links. If you park with your wheels pointing out you can get a hand behind and give it a good pull.

Mine only had slight play on one side and sounded awful. I used Meyle HD links and I can vouch for the quality, they're good i'd say they seem nicer quality than the Fiat original and different league to the standard cheapo ebay jobs.

daveofkent said:

I used Meyle HD links and I can vouch for the quality, they're good i'd say they seem nicer quality than the Fiat original and different league to the standard cheapo ebay jobs.

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I'd agree with this sensible suggestion - the Meyle links have larger ball joints in the same size housing and a four year guarantee. Worth it by miles, even though the initial cost is a few pounds more.

If its a 100Hp then they are hard on drop links/top mounts/track rod ends... having said that I've replaced all three recently on mine and I still get a little rattle from the front near side on a really bad road.. go figure..

I have been to several mechanics about this.
First said it's the top mount, second said it's the new shock, third said it's the steering box, forth said there is something touching something else (among the many things partying down there) around the engine.

Tomorrow I am going to stick my mobile down there somehow and record.

andy1 said:

Yes, I am considering that. But it is odd that the noise continues at minute 1.10 on that fine stretch...

Click to expand...

If it is drop links, the rattle occurs whenever there is a twist on the roll bar, so any change in relative height between sides will cause it. A smooth road, but not flat will do this.

andy1 said:

I have been to several mechanics about this.
First said it's the top mount, second said it's the new shock, third said it's the steering box, forth said there is something touching something else (among the many things partying down there) around the engine.

Tomorrow I am going to stick my mobile down there somehow and record.

Click to expand...

Stop speculating. The online diagnosis will not change until you've had a look instead of a listen. The mechanics are guessing based on experience of many makes and models, the forum members are speaking from real experience of this car!
Get the wheels off, release the drop links and check the ball joints on them. If you can move them by hand, they are shot.

portland_bill said:

Stop speculating. The online diagnosis will not change until you've had a look instead of a listen. The mechanics are guessing based on experience of many makes and models, the forum members are speaking from real experience of this car!

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Taking a car to several mechanics is not speculating.
I am always there looking under the car and it's one of the first things they check (touching,pushing,pulling,etc)
I will replace them with the top mounts and be done with it

General question then:


We've talked about the better quality drop links. Are there also better quality top mounts also?

portland_bill said:

Get the wheels off, release the drop links and check the ball joints on them. If you can move them by hand, they are shot.

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Huh? You are able to move brand new droplinks by hand.
Do you mean if there is hardly any resistance when you move them they are shot?

AB100 said:

General question then:
We've talked about the better quality drop links. Are there also better quality top mounts also?

Click to expand...

I second this question...

portland_bill said:

Get the wheels off, release the drop links and check the ball joints on them. If you can move them by hand, they are shot.

Click to expand...

fpan said:

Huh? You are able to move brand new droplinks by hand.
Do you mean if there is hardly any resistance when you move them they are shot?

Click to expand...

New droplinks should be tight and very stiff to move by hand. If they move easily, they are shot.

Some second hand ones (oem) that i bought that have supposedly done 3k miles or so are more loose than the ones on the car that have done almost 40k miles. they came from a turbo panda so maybe the extra power and associated wheel spin killed them...
what's the life span of oem ones? i have an occasional rattle when going over deep recesses.

My original ones lasted 8 years and 47000 miles.
Replaced with more OEMs from Shop4Parts.

No matter what make, more will depend on the state of the roads mostly driven.

After many months I discovered it was the caliper moving on poor quality roads making that strange sound.

The screws that connect the caliper to the caliper bracket are bad.

Getting the right tightening of the top screw is complicated. As the brake fluid pipe is in the way I had to connect an extension to my torque wrench.

This is bad because it means a less accurate torque reading. I torqued too much and broke the screw because of it.

I am confident that the value written on the workshop manual is wrong.

Just look at the screw and tell me how can you possibly take it to 10 daNm = 100 Nm without breaking it. Madness.

I had to pay for 2 new screw threads but finally no more noises.

Where there's a will there's a way!