Today's morning project:

One thing that I've been concerned with was this rattle in the rear deck that would occur when listening to songs that contained deep bass. And no, i don't listen to hip hop/rap or others that make me feel like i'm sporting a pimp mobile - i'd have gotten an Escalade if I wanted that.

I initially thought that it was the big grill that covered the sub that was rattling. Not wanting to destroy it b/c it was on so tight, I decided i'd get to it from the bottom.

From the trunk, i removed the lining underneath the shelf. It is held on by six plastic expansion type clips. You remove the center plastic head and the outer collar just pops out. These are very common amongst the auto industry.

After removing these clips, you also have to remove the spring loaded T-shaped soft spring hooks that are used for attaching light items and/or cargo net. It's held on by two screws for each hook.

Once these were removed, you can easily pull the lining down and away. Do not pull too far down b/c there are two trunk accessory lights attached to the lining. Wiggle the connectors out and the lining will be completely free to remove. it's a tight fit, so angling one side of the lining down helps get the whole piece out of the trunk.

Now the fun part. The sub is mounted to a metal enclosure by four screws (appear to be 10mm). i thought about removing the whole sub but after listening carefully and using my fingers as vibration dampers, i found that the rattle was coming from two brackets that are attached to the frame of the car. One end of the bracket is bolted to the frame and the other to the enclosure. The frame-side of these brackets are held on by fastening screws of which it was impossible for me to get to b/c the heads were facing up and inside the frame of the car.

solution?

high density closed cell foam. I cut out two 1/4" thick pieces of this foam and wedged it b/w the bracket itself and the frame of the car. I packed it as tight and as close to the frame-side mount area as possible.

And voila! it worked! I sat for about an hour this morning listening to every CD i had in the changer. Previously, the rattle was so bad that I had to reduce the sub volume about three to four clicks down from the middle. And even so, there were some songs that still manage to get the sub going down low. I considered bass blockers but i didn't want to cut into the sound system wires.

i've considered taking the car in for the problem but i don't trust techs with these kinds of issues. they won't spend the same amount of time as me and they, often times, just replace the parts - which usually requires that they need to order any new parts that they've destroyed in the process. worse, the rattle could come back but this time, in some other location as the re-install can be rushed as well.

and the high density closed cell foam? there's a foam applicator product that allows you to spray on tire shine and apply it w/o getting your hands dirty. it doesn't really work as well as I thought it should (absorbs more tire gloss than applies it). I had some of this product laying around and the area which you hold it has some of this high density foam. It worked perfectly.

hope this helps!

so far, i've logged 3100 miles and this has been my only problem thus far (knock on amber wood).

 

great to hear... i had to use great stuff to "reinforce" my rear deck. you provide a cleaner answer.

 

So this was the stock Bose system you did it to?

 

yes, but it was done for the '04 (D3) model. maybe the D2 models are the same?

 

If you took some pictures, we could make a procedure, especially if this is a common problem.....sounds like it is.

pw

 

Nothing like a huge surprise puff of air on your leg while you're driving.

 

hi my 00/a8 ate my cd need help to r-r cd.