My Nissan Leaf Forum

wow,....sounds like a woodpecker on the side of a house when listening on the inside. It's more of a knock on plastic than a pop I think. It's almost like a bolt that's hanging and swinging and hitting plastic. I wonder if a rock got up inside the plastic skid plate underneath the car??? When listening I kept thinking about Poe's Tell Tale Heart.

I think it might still be worthwhile to pull the under-car belly pan. It's not that hard and I think you can find good instructions in the "horn replacement" thread. If anything was dropped it's likely resting on that pan.

Rattles can be devilishly hard to localize. Sometimes passengers can help to pinpoint it. Also it can help if you yourself let someone else drive so you can listen from different places in the car. I have even resorted to using a stethoscope while someone else was driving, to help localize the source. I'd also try pressing on various trim pieces that are in reach to see if that modifies the sound -- particularly the ones surrounding the windshield, if those were removed during the windshield replacement?

What you said is exactly what I was thinking of, something hanging and swinging around like a pendulum, hitting some plastic pieces. I just said popping for lack of a better word, but it can easily be a knock on plastic like you said. The only thing I haven't done is to remove the plastic plate from underneath the car to check. So I think I'm going to do this next because I'm really out of options to try. Thanks.

This noise seems to happen after they replaced my windshield, but I can't be absolutely sure it's because of the windshield replacement. I did check the trim pieces around the new windshield and I found one slightly loose piece of plastic trim not snapped in place, which I did snapped back in, but it didn't help.

I think I'll check the under-car belly can like you suggested next and will report back.