V8V mystery rattle

[codieskid]

Hi all

I've had my car a few weeks and all has been fine but while driving home from a friends tonight and after going over a couple of speed bumps I heard a loud metallic rattle from the front of the car. It sounded like my front grill had come loose or something so I pulled over and checked but both front grilles were as they should be. I carried on driving again and kept hearing it, it sounds like the noise I got when my heat shield came off an old Honda years ago.

I've had a look under the car but nothing is loose that I can see. It wasn't like I hit the speed bumps hard/fast, I take them like a granddad as still getting used to the car.

Any ideas what it could be? I've also had a quick look under the bonnet but all looks fine but obviously can't see under the front tray/cover where the radiator is.

Any help much appreciated

Trev

[V12woollie]

Might be you've picked up a stone. If it is, sometimes reversing quickly will dislodge it. It sounds awful and you think something metal had fallen off and is dragging along.

[divetheworld]

Check the Windscreen wiper access panel. I had mine get loose, only by a small amount. Drove me up the wall.
Sounds like a loose heatshield or similar. Its part of the firewall and not easy to get to behind the inlet manifold.
Mine was also temperature dependant, it needed to get some heat up before it rattled.

[ds2000]

V12woollie said:

Might be you've picked up a stone. If it is, sometimes reversing quickly will dislodge it. It sounds awful and you think something metal had fallen off and is dragging along.

Woollie could well be on the money with this, happened to me in France last year, quick reverse and the stone was gone. Thankfully, I didn't fancy 300 miles with it screaming at me

[brakedwell]

One of the front mild steel disc back covers might be misaligned after going over the speed humps. This happened when my son's V8 Vantage ran over sunken ironwork on the clapped out A283. The back covers are easy to realign.

[montecristo]

I had that before. It sounded like I was dragging something metal under the car, but when I stopped to check it, I couldn't see anything. Haven't had it in the six months since.

There's a thread somewhere (call me Mr Helpful) that discussed this noise and concluded it wasn't important.

It's your call, but if the sound has gone, I wouldn't worry about it.

[codieskid]

Thanks all, very useful as always. I'll take a look tonight and see if there might be a stone in there somewhere or if it's one of the other things mentioned. I don't get the noise at speed just over bumps but it does sound like something scraping on the floor.

[codieskid]

Well had a look at the areas suggested and couldn't see anything loose so tried the fast reversing trick. Took the car out for a drive and heard the sound again once. Seemed to be a slow speed under slight braking. Took the car for longer 20 minute drive to see if I could recreate the noise but it's gone. Hopefully whatever it was has worked itself out, could well have been a stone but it was very loud when it happened.

Anyway a nice excuse to take the car for a little run on another lovely night and touch wood hopefully the rattle has gone



Trev