Arg! Rattle!
Over lunch today I enjoyed a sunny, mid-30s day driving the Ghia out to the suburbs just to get a sub. On the way back I heard a horrible sound on the highway. It was a fast, rhythmic "ticka-ticka-ticka-ticka-ticka!" sound very obviously keeping pace with wheel rotation from the rear-right of the car.
I pulled onto a side street and drove 10 nerve-wracking miles home getting very familiar with the sound and symptoms. It was just as I've experienced before: only during acceleration and more pronounced when turning right. This time, though, it was still pretty damn loud going straight and even a little turning left. I'd hardly hear anything coasting or braking, although every now and then I'd hear a little *bump-scrape* even then.
Got home to the garage OK, jacked up the rear-right and took the wheel off. For the second time I checked for evidence of bad bearings or CV joints and everything still looked OK. If I had bad bearings or CV joints and it was only showing up after those parts heated up from driving then I should have easily felt something amiss. I poked around some more for anything else such as the clip holding the emergency brake cable to the diagonal beam and found nothing until I wiggled the heater box.
There was a good inch of free play with the heater box around the exhaust pipe right by where it connects to the rubber accordian ducts that provide cabin heat. I figured it was loose enough to hang down onto the drive axle and scrape on it. I wired it up to keep it out of the way, replaced the wheel and took another test drive. No more rattle.
I'll have to figure out a plan to patch up that heater box as I'm no doubt losing a lot of heat out that gap when I could really use it in the cabin. But, for now I'm just glad (again) to know there's nothing seriously wrong with the car.
I pulled onto a side street and drove 10 nerve-wracking miles home getting very familiar with the sound and symptoms. It was just as I've experienced before: only during acceleration and more pronounced when turning right. This time, though, it was still pretty damn loud going straight and even a little turning left. I'd hardly hear anything coasting or braking, although every now and then I'd hear a little *bump-scrape* even then.
Got home to the garage OK, jacked up the rear-right and took the wheel off. For the second time I checked for evidence of bad bearings or CV joints and everything still looked OK. If I had bad bearings or CV joints and it was only showing up after those parts heated up from driving then I should have easily felt something amiss. I poked around some more for anything else such as the clip holding the emergency brake cable to the diagonal beam and found nothing until I wiggled the heater box.
There was a good inch of free play with the heater box around the exhaust pipe right by where it connects to the rubber accordian ducts that provide cabin heat. I figured it was loose enough to hang down onto the drive axle and scrape on it. I wired it up to keep it out of the way, replaced the wheel and took another test drive. No more rattle.
I'll have to figure out a plan to patch up that heater box as I'm no doubt losing a lot of heat out that gap when I could really use it in the cabin. But, for now I'm just glad (again) to know there's nothing seriously wrong with the car.
posted by Chris Druckenmiller at 11:09 AM
1 Comments:
Did that noise come back after you made the adjustment? My girlfriend's Karmann Ghia was making that exact same noise with the same symptoms (worse when turning right). We took the wheel off and inspected the bearings and CV boot/joint, but everything looked fine. When we put the wheel back on, without any other adjustments, the noise had gone away. Two months passed and now the noise is back.
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