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Thanks for this. I’m obviously hoping for a permanent fix eventually but hopefully this quells the boo-birds who think Tesla’s ignoring the strut rattle issue. I’ll be seeing if the sound reappears over the next few days and letting the service center know about this part if it does. The technician seemed to appreciate I’d done my homework prior to showing up with the car, especially since mine was the first with the problem the service center had seen.
That seems as a temporary fix.
Do you feel a difference in suspension performance when the rattle is worse? Some days my car is riding really compliant with little rattle, other days I feel it rides with like a locked out damper and a lot of rattling. Same air susp ride height.
Do you feel a difference in suspension performance when the rattle is worse? Some days my car is riding really compliant with little rattle, other days I feel it rides with like a locked out damper and a lot of rattling. Same air susp ride height.
To Drlev, the fix is not a real fix on the root cause. We'll test it this evening. The SC said they were working with the Strut manuf Bilstein to work on a real fix.
To Daktari, the noise occur all the time but much more noticeable on city streets at city speeds up to 20 mph. On really smooth city surfaces i can still hear it at 35mph. After 5 months of this I have a trained ear now. It is consistent between different suspension heights and ambient temperatures. No change in suspension performance that I have noticed.
To Daktari, the noise occur all the time but much more noticeable on city streets at city speeds up to 20 mph. On really smooth city surfaces i can still hear it at 35mph. After 5 months of this I have a trained ear now. It is consistent between different suspension heights and ambient temperatures. No change in suspension performance that I have noticed.
okay, I picked the car up this evening and the impact of the new strut braces is 'quiet' good...excuse the pun. Its because I'm happier driving the car home this evening than anytime the past 5 months. It will take a few more days for a full analysis but on smooth roads at 30 mph, the vibration is essentially gone.
At lower speeds, 10 to 20 mph the vibration has been knocked down to a slight muffle on rougher city street surfaces.. Its still there because of my brain muscle memory still recognizes the vibration. If you slow the car down to sub 10 mph and let it coast down a hill, you will still hear the rattle. But a passenger would have difficulty noticing it. I would say that at this condition, 70-80% of the annoyance has been removed but not 100%
So overall the experience of driving city streets has definitely improved and I'm very happy about the fix but the underlying problem is still there and Tesla needs to resolve it.
At lower speeds, 10 to 20 mph the vibration has been knocked down to a slight muffle on rougher city street surfaces.. Its still there because of my brain muscle memory still recognizes the vibration. If you slow the car down to sub 10 mph and let it coast down a hill, you will still hear the rattle. But a passenger would have difficulty noticing it. I would say that at this condition, 70-80% of the annoyance has been removed but not 100%
So overall the experience of driving city streets has definitely improved and I'm very happy about the fix but the underlying problem is still there and Tesla needs to resolve it.
Just dropped off my car at Tampa Service Center and provided them with the pictures posted by paulipaddy (thank you). They provided a brand NEW 100D loaner and it too has the same strut/brace rattle. I think ALL the cars produced with air suspension 2017-2018 have this rattle and the owners that have not noticed either have poor hearing or are brain dead.
Anyway I totally agree with paulipaddy above that I appreciate Tesla has a temporary fix but they need to turn up the heat on the strut manufacturer, which I assume is Firestone.
When I get the car back I will immediately report the status.
Anyway I totally agree with paulipaddy above that I appreciate Tesla has a temporary fix but they need to turn up the heat on the strut manufacturer, which I assume is Firestone.
When I get the car back I will immediately report the status.
Why are people reporting this rattle when they clearly have pictures of Firestone struts?
Cram collision
Member
Well fixed the rattle that I would of bet money was the dash. What I found on my 2016.5 was on the blisten strut was a thin plate maybe 2.5 mil thick that separated the strut mount plate and the strut from direct contact with the tower had a thick decal or part number that had worn through or added the ability for the strut to vibrate or move. The top strut bolt were tighten to about 60 foot pounds pretty tight. So what I did was added a urethan membrane between booth surfaces under the strut tower and no more annoying rattle.
artsci
Sponsor
Diagnosed the source of my rattle problem this morning. It's the front sway bar and the rattle appears to be coming from where the sway bar attaches to the drop links. I can move the sway bar by hand and that faintly produces the rattle. The illustration below from the service manual indicates the source of the rattle. This info should be a big help to my service center as they do the repairs.
Nosken
Active Member
Thanks--I hope that is the issue!
Were both sides "loose"? Were you able to tighten the nut?
artsci
Sponsor
I wan't able to do anything, as the car was on a lift at a tire place where I had the spacers removed before I took the car to Tesla service this week. I asked them to check out the rattle and they invited me to observe when they found the problem.
I'm suspicious that this may be a result of both control arms having been replaced by Tesla service about a month ago. They probably didn't tighten some nuts down sufficiently, which is a cause for major concern, especially since all of the service centers are under pressure from corporate to make repairs more quickly, which can lead to sloppy work on repairs.
From reading through this thread, it is obvious that there are multiple possible sources of rattles from the front of the car, but it seems that when everything else has been checked/replaced, many owners of cars with the Bilstein strut still have a rattle, if you have a rattle with Firestone struts it is likely that one of these other solutions will work...
Tesla-Bjørn has a video about his repair bills, and he links to a video with an interesting and familiar noise (not a Tesla though): according to the owner, a broken sway bar link: What is most interesting is the character and frequency.
I have a recently purchased 2016 75d, air suspension, that has the same problem. Local Tesla shop tells me it's a problem with the newer air unit's mounting brackets. They tell me they will let me know when the fix is available. Not sure they know what they are talking about. Not happy. Neither my 1999 Audi A8 nor my 2010 Prius have similar noises.
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