Our car has a few trademark creaks and rattles in it, like all C4's do, and this does not bother me in the least. There is, however, one rattle that appears at random times and is very very annoying. It sounds like a hammer being tapped on the frame underneath the car. To me it sounds like it is originating somewhere right behind me, a little on the passengers side of the car. It is most prevalent (when it's there) on right turns. Left turns are quiet as a church mouse.

I have an app't with my mechanic tomorrow morning to look for this, but thought I'd pose the question here to see if anyone else had some ideas I could present to my mechanic to make all our lives a little easier?

I can tell he's not looking forward to trying to isolate this noise... but, he's a dear friend and our most trusted mechanic for over 20 years now, so he's willing to dive into it.

 

Hey!! Do you think this may be related to your bursh with the curb? If it is,then definitely have it looked at!! Just to be safe,ok? Joe.

 

Sounds like either trailing arm bushings or the strut rod underneath from the differential housing to the spindle. May even be a worn shock bushing. [8D]

 

Thanks Joe, I appreciate you taking the time to post. I forgot to mention in the original post that this problem has been evident since the day we bought the car. It's real random, and only shows up like once or twice a month....

THANKS mech!!! I am going to share this info with my mechanic. On Friday we took a quick 30 second whack at the can, so to speak. I couldn't get the noise to appear at all. My mechanic suggested we change the rear-end fluid and put in some POSI additive, just to make sure it wasn't the POSI clutches. I didn't mind doing that at all, seems like good maintenance to me, but I didn't think it would fix it. And it didn't. So, I will be sharing your ideas here with my mechanic sometime in the next couple weeks.

Thanks, mech, I really really appreciate your input.