Folk,
I would be grateful for you advice on this one:

New Panda Dynamic 1.2

When driving in very wet conditions, I am always startled by a sort of "Machine Gun" noise that lasts for about 30-60 secs when I drive through a puddle or standing water. The noise is accompanied by severe vibration in the central floor ridge underneath the handbrake.

The noise sounds more like something with very high voltage arcing to earth - rather than a metalic sound.

The noise seems to have no detrimental effect and the car runs fine (both in the wet and dry).

I have checked under the car, and can't see anything obvious. The only thing I could think of was that maybe water was dripping down from the underside of the floor pan onto the exhaust - where it was boiling/instantly vapourising.

Any ideas?

Thanks,
Woody.

Did this noise start before or after your crash? The reason I ask is that it could be something to do with a part that has moved because of the crash.

specs78 said:

Did this noise start before or after your crash? The reason I ask is that it could be something to do with a part that has moved because of the crash.

Click to expand...

I have had the noise ever since I bought it (new) in Sept 2004. I only get it when the underside of the car gets really soaked - and then the noise only lasts for 30 - 120 secs.

Best wishes,
Woody.

Have you taken the car into your dealer? It could be quite dangerous if left un-fixed....

I have my car for about five weeks now and never experienced the noise untill this morning. I drove through some water and suddenly there was the 'machine gun' noise. I don't understand it because I have driven the car in wet weather before. After it happened this morning I drove through every puddle of water that I could find but the noise didn't return.
It happened on a bumpy road so maybe it is a combination of bumps and water. I'll have a look under the car tonight but don't expect to find anything unusual. Would be interesting to hear if more people experienced the noise. Maybe you can hit some puddles on your way home tonight!

Well, it's been quite wet down in the south recently....

Got the noise again yesterday, and with the noise came slightly "rougher" running for the duration of the noise.

Looking under the hood, I can see that in the rough direction of where it seems the noise is coming from, is the bend of the exhaust as it leaves the bottom of the engine. Connected at that point is something I presume to be a lambda sensor - I wonder if this is faulty/shorting out in the wet and the noise I hear is arcing to the chassis?

Any mechanics out there?

Best wishes,
Woody.

Had a 205 that would do that - when going through puddles. Traced it to the exhaust pipe.

I have had the very same noise. Didn't think anything of it 'till i read all of the above. Haven't mentioned it to dealer as they had enough problems to sort out with my new Eleganza. I will keep more of an ear out for it next time.

i sometimes get the same problem with my panda 1100, but my panda is the old shape (1994 model), i often have to drive through a ford (river crossing) and the machine gun noise happens for about 2 minutes.

That's interesting. Does anyone know what parts on the New Panda are carried forward from the old?

In a separate thread, I also see that a few folk are saying that the -electric- power steering is failing when the car gets very wet.

Are these two issues connected?

it looks like it might be the cold water hitting a hot exhaust thats the problem, as i tried spraying the hot exhaust with a spray bottle filled with water, and the machine gun sound happened, so it seems to be the lower part of the manifold.

It is the exhaust that makes the noise, the noise and vibration happen when the exhaust is hot and is rapidly cooled by going through a large puddle. The vibration is the centre exhaust mounting near the handbrake lever. I changed an exhaust and this cured it. I am currently investigating another car for a permanent fix, it is possible that the exhaust could be repositioned to eliminate this.

This is fantastic news - not least because it means that the problem is minor.

Or is it?

What effect will that level of vibration have on the catalytic converter? Will we find that the structure in the cat rattles loose and collapses over time?

The other interesting thing is to understand why some folks have the problem, and others don't.

Thanks very much for posting, and I, for one, would be very grateful if you could keep us updated with what you discover.

eleganza1.2 said:

I have had the very same noise. Didn't think anything of it 'till i read all of the above. Haven't mentioned it to dealer as they had enough problems to sort out with my new Eleganza. I will keep more of an ear out for it next time.

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Hi

Being new to this forum, I am not aware of the story of your Eleganza problems, what sort of problems are you having and how is your dealer sorting out the problems or not ?

Thanks,

BJ20

My car is the multijet, I didn't notice any "machine gun" noise while driving in heavy rain on Saturday.
A possible reason being that a diesel exhaust runs a lot cooler than a petrol.

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