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My 14 year old W212 had this intermittent rattling noise from the front when decelerating to about 40kmh to 20kmh, it will happen when engine is heated up. The rattle noise sounds like a rotating mechanism knocking or marbles hitting some metal walls. The problem is difficult to troubleshoot due to the intermittent nature of the noise and only when the car is moving . I have to highlight that I am one who will not save on maintenance, so it is not due to lack of servicing. Let me share the trouble I have to go through to nail the cause, or at least, I believe the mechanic have found the cause. It started off with the intermittent noise, to rule out some of the possible causes and guess work, I want to highlight that I have replaced engine mounts , transmission mounts, belts , tensioner, cam adjusters, timing chain etc, even the drive shaft bearing and bracket was replaced. Most of those mentioned items were replaced as part of wear and tear or as preventive maintenance along the way during various servicing schedules till my car has reached 200k km now, except for the drive shaft bearing and bracket , it was the one that I told my workshop to replace it as part of problem isolation. I also asked the mechanic to check if there was metal parts like heat shield or exhaust that may come very close to contact with other metal or mountings, but there was none. 2nd workshop Since the first workshop couldn't pin point the problem, I asked another of my regular workshop, the mechanic heard the noise and told me could be auto transmission and he will have to open up the autotrans and service the whole unit, I was not convinced that it could be the autotrans but I could not fault the mechanic since he had only heard the noise for the first time. I told him more likely to be the engine and asked if he could check the valve lifter etc, but he didnt think so. 3rd Workshop To validate the findings form the 2nd workshop, i sent the car to an autotrans specialist that i repaired my Odyssey gear box before to get a 2nd opinion, incidentally, the car came up with a engine check light when we rev the engine hard during the test drive, he had also heard the noise. He told me my ECU was having problem after reading the code from OBD. Again i was not convinced the noise can be caused by ECU, I didnt want to speculate why the engine check light first. I check the error code when i reached home, it was indicating cylinder 4 having fault. 4th workshop Not convinced with the autotrans specialist, I sent my car to another autotrans and engine specialist workshop, the guy heard the noise, check the code, he didnt know what happen, asked me to leave the car with him. After the next full day, he told me he could not find the problem, I asked him to open the engine block to check, look out for hairline cracks, valve lifters defects etc, he asked me if i was sure that I wanted to open the engine block, i told him to proceed. Another day had gone and he said still no fault found, I was a little panic then, I told myself cant be so complicated or bad luck. Fortunately, on the 4th day, he told he he found the knocking, it was due to a piston that was slightly loosen and was knocking against the cylinder. With that, I was more convinced with the finding, at least it was likely the cause of knocking and it explained why only when the engine was heated up. Those who know about engine would know what happen next, the engine will have to be overhauled. He told me that will need at least 5k, but that was not my concern, I am hoping that the problem could be resolved once and for all. My experience indicates one thing, one needs to have some car knowledge in order to drive an old car, otherwise, otherwise one maybe taken for a ride by workshops. Not that they will cheat but the problem is when they only get to see or hear a problem for once, their diagnostic and conclusion may not be accurate, especially when a problem is intermittent, the owner who drive the car everyday have to provide feedback accurately, take the input from mechanics and decide if the findings make sense. Now on the workshops, one may think that I anyhow find a workshop to diagnose a strange problem, no i did not, all the workshops that i engaged are not fly by night workshops, they are reputable and very experience workshops , just that the problem i had was unique and more difficult to troubleshoot. The repair should be done by mid to late next week, I really hope the problem could be resolved and I personally think so. Meantime I have to be contented with my Altis.🤣

Rattle noises are very common in many cars, even when new. There are a thousand causes of unwanted noises in a car and I'm sure many of you had spent many frustrated hours trying to rid them. I am very sensitive to interior cabin noises and will always spend alot of efforts trying to identify and eliminate them. So I thought of starting this thread for everybody to share how they solve their unwanted car noises. Here, I want to share one type that had been bugging me for 6 months and how to solve it. I have other cases and I will subsequently post them in this thread, with photos to guide. I drive a 2014 Sylphy. This particular rattle noise is a single "tiak" sound that sounded usually when turning or small road perturbations at slower speed. It seems to come from front passenger dash area. It sounded like something loose hitting gently against plastic. Had tried to rectify it with tan chong during last 3 servicing but not successful. I was pretty sure the source is from within the cabin or dash area and not from engine bay area so I had been spending majority of my efforts internally. I was wrong. It came from engine bay area. There is this cable that was not secured, at the battery side, near to the front left suspension top mount. See photo. If i manually hit it against the metal chassis, it produced a similar tiak sound. So i use a cable tie to secure it so it does not move freely. After that, that tiak sound was no longer there. I tested through 1 day of normal driving. I am not sure what signal this cable carries but there is a similar one at the other side. I secured that as well. So look around your engine bay area for such unsecured cables and clamp it down!

hi, im currently driving a 08 legacy and my dashboard rattles.. did some research got pple post abt removing the whole dashboard and fix d problem. problem is, i dunno how to do it any bros or sis out here got any workshop to recommend? i really love me car but the sound is driving me nuts an example of how they fix it: http://legacygt.com/forums/showthread.php/...me-9-87104.html

Keep engine smooth and rattle free at startup. If your engine rattles at startup it can be because your oil filter doesn't have an AntiDrainBackValve (ADBV). If you buy a cheap Fram oil filter you are doing more harm than good, even if you change your oil often. Check with your brands over there I know that PureOne or Wix/NAPA Gold have an ADBV valve. If your car rattle only at start up chances are if you use a filter with a ADBV it will be a memory! Hope that is helpful, peace Sammy