Hi,
My car recently started to do some noise at startup. It does for a few seconds then stops.
It sounds like a sharp grinding noise : tchick tchick tchick. Then I press the gaz pedal, it goes faster and then it stops.
After that I don't hear it all day long.
What is it?

Bravo 1.6 ph.2/2001/90000km. all belts and tensionners done less than 2 years ago.

Thanks,
Fredo

i have the same problem, mainly in the cold,
I believe it is the starter motor solonoid just gets a bit stuck out and makes a grinding noise, then goes back in where it is ment to be, but ive never worried about it.
Don't think it does much damage unless anyone else tells me it does.......... :s

Hi,
Thank you for answering.
I'm not sure it is the starter motor, because I already had the starter motor solenoid problem and I found a trick to make it go out :
When you start up your car, turn on ignition withou t starting engine, wait for your pump to stop making noise, then start your engine. Do it a few times and your starter motor won't stick anymore.

The starter motor get stuck if you put your key in and immediatly turn on engine.

Last, the starter motor only did noise once and long as opposed to a succession of small noises that my car is doing.

I still hope you're right and it's only the solenoid, because if it is not that, it will probably cost money...

Fredo, you need to find out exactly where the noise is coming from. It could be a number of things but narrowing down the location would help to diagnose probable causes.

I tried to find this morning, and it looked like it was coming from the upper part of the engine.
It did not seem to come from cambelt so I feel better.
But it is usually more noisy, so I'm not sure. And it's not the same noise if you're sit in driver side or in front of the car.

I will try again tomorrow until I find it exactly!

I thought someone would have had experience about something similar.

Anyways, thanks for the help!

It could possibly be a camshaft lubrication issue. I don't know too much about the 1.6, perhaps one of the other guys will be able to help.

It looks like the car has stopped making noise...

I suspect this is temperature related : I was using 5w40 oil and switched to 10w40 in mid january where the temperature was colder. So the car started make noise (one month after). Now the temperature is above 10 so the oil is more efficient!

This is in favor of the camshaft lubrification issue. I will probably switch back to 5w40 next year.

Thanks