Popping noise under the dashboard

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Volusiano said:
I finally got around to recording a Youtube video for your viewing/listening. Of course the video is immaterial, only the sound track is.

Here's the link. You can hear the popping noise throughout the clip randomly. Ignore a one time left-turn signal clicker sound at 0:15. Some examples of the popping sound is at 0:02, 0:04, 0:06, 0:10, etc.

The popping sound may sound faint on the video, but it's pretty clear and annoying from inside the car. The iPhone just didn't pick it up very well.

If you have any idea what it may be, your opinion would be very much appreciated! Thanks.

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?
 
ksnogas2112 said:
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.
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.
 
Nubo said:
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?
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.
 
Did you ever figure out what the noise was. I recently started hearing a similar noise. Very difficult to even determine where the sound was coming from. The noise does seems to correspond to bumps in the road so there seems to be no real pattern to the noise. The best source I have come up with so far is that I accidentally shook the driver seat buckle while buckled in and it seems to make a similar sound and seemed to stop the noise. I'm not convinced that I am right but wondering if you solved for your sound.
 
Sorry Leaf1, I never did figure out the source of my sound. I ended up selling my LEAF back to Nissan (hot Phoenix battery capacity issue) back in February of this year, so I guess that's one way to get rid of the sound. :lol:

I must admit that toward the end, it was REALLY driving me crazy. I learned to ignore it but that didn't work. It started to drive my wife crazy as well. It was really the only mar in my driving experience with the LEAF (spare the hot weather battery capacity loss). I was glad to get rid of that noise by selling back the car to Nissan.

Your driver seat buckle guess may be plausible, but I didn't hear my noise by where the buckle or seat belt mechanism is. I think it came from the dashboard, but it was so elusive that you can't really pinpoint the location to a specific place. But I did describe it as being like something on a pendulum swinging freely and half of the times swinging far enough to hit something. So your suspicion of the seat belt buckle makes me wonder if the seat belt mechanism has some kind of a pendulum design to choke onto the seat belt when there's a plunging motion forward, and it's defective somehow or is swinging too freely...
 
OK... well... here I am, the third person with the noise.

On mine... I hear it every time I accelerate, and every time I brake. It sounds like a CLACK and I can also relate to your sound of a POP too. Almost like a swinging heavy bolt hitting a suspended wall of cardboard. I dont understand why sometimes it sounds louder than others. That is, faster or slower acceleration/braking does not seem to related to the volume of the sound.

I am now into my 5th week of ownership of a 2013SL/Premium package.

I pegged the sound to be around my drivers side brake but admit, it is really hard to localize to a set point. My carpool partner says it is not my brake side but his brakes side so this gives you an ideal of how hard it is to pinpoint.

I dont see anything loose under the carriage or hood. I might try to record the sound as I am pretty sure I can do better than the previous video sound recording.
 
Here is a sound clip of my noise.

From an iPhone video I stripped out the sound to WAV. From there I suppressed the sound before and after the pop/clack/knock sound. Then I did the opposite to the problematic sound by increasing its volume. I cut out much of the activity between knocks so the video would not last too long. Then I used Windows Movie Maker to add video to the sound clip by just entering a photo. Lastly an upload to Youtube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RLX0WR6ppVo" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

I am stumped unless somebody has been down this road before.
 
I have definitely figured out that the source of my clicking sound is my driver side seat belt buckle. For some reason the buckle is a little loose when buckled sometimes and other times it is snug and does not make a noise. I too swore that this sound was coming from the dash or radio - it is very surprising how the sound would travel from the buckle.
 
Check this thread out http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?f=30&t=11420" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

The culprit discovered in this thread is most likely the source of my popping/rattling noise under the dashboard.
 
ehunter said:
Here is a sound clip of my noise.

From an iPhone video I stripped out the sound to WAV. From there I suppressed the sound before and after the pop/clack/knock sound. Then I did the opposite to the problematic sound by increasing its volume. I cut out much of the activity between knocks so the video would not last too long. Then I used Windows Movie Maker to add video to the sound clip by just entering a photo. Lastly an upload to Youtube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RLX0WR6ppVo" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

I am stumped unless somebody has been down this road before.

Well, for me this one is solved.

After speaking to the dealership mechanics, the sound is due to the front axle shifting during acceleration and deceleration. The mechanics told me about others before me and the first guy with the problem had to have his whole front end system shipped back to Tennessee to be analyzed. Turns out the factory did not adequately lubricate a specific area of the front axle.

There is a service bulletin for this distributed by Nissan #NTB12-055c

Nissan got the car at 8am, they called me at 11am to say it is finished and that included a tire rotation.

There is an existing TSB for this, #NTB12-055c.

I hope this helps others having the same symptoms.
 
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