Vibrating/Creaking Armrest

[howitts_done]

My car is about 3 months old and the armrest between the front seats is creaking. At first I thought it was my iPod or the aux cable but it appears that the armrest isn't snug when it is closed causing it to vibrate and creak. :complain

Is this covered under Mazda warranty?

[EvilEric]

I think someone mentioned this before and it was related to seats and seat belts? As for the "arm rest" divider unit of the front. You can open the box and you'll see 2 nuts that u can unscrew or tighten to make it fit better. The entire thing is plastic so i don't see how it can be the source of your squeaking noise.

At the same time check the passenger side seat, it might not be tight or it's from wear/tear???

[bummer]

I noticed the same creaking armrest problem shortly after getting my MS3 in August. I put a piece of weather stripping on the base where each lid latches. By "base" I mean, when you open the lid, look down at the part the lid latches to when you close it. I put the weather strip between the two little rubber "feet". At first I had to slam the lid down to make it latch, because the weather strip was higher than the "feet". Now the strips have compressed a bit and it's perfect; closes normally, and no more creaks!

[chinsterr]

Is this covered under Mazda warranty?

My passenger door was creaking when the car was only two weeks old. I told Avante about the noise and they took apart the door panel and put it back together ----which only amplified the problem. But yes, they did cover it under warranty work.

[nicker]

Id try the weather stripping solution first to see if that helps. If it does then you know for sure that was your issue. Then if it still bothers you go from there. But for sure it would be warrantied.

[raine]

yea same issue with my car. i noticed some clicking noise to the left of me when i drive. its so freggin annoying. other days i hear clicking noise from the glove compartment even when i emptied it. hate it!

[matt9]

The conclusion from all this is that EVERYTHING inside the M3 creaks/squeeks/rattles. For something that looks good....its quite the piece of..

[Mr. Dalvin]

yea same issue with my car. i noticed some clicking noise to the left of me when i drive. its so freggin annoying. other days i hear clicking noise from the glove compartment even when i emptied it. hate it!

door noise . . . check.
glove compartment noise . . . check.
armrest lid noise . . . check.
squeeky seatbelt/seat bolt . . . check.
sometimes wish i bought the civic i test drove before the 3 . . . check.
cringe and shudder 5 seconds after aforementioned civic thought . . . check.

it's really a tough situation. the 3 isn't exactly "cheap". it's a lot of money for a car that seems to rattle, squeek, and creak . . . but there's no other new car in this price range that i'd feel alright to pay that much money for.

[garboui]

for the most part the mz3 is a pretty quiet car for its price range. comparing to my dads accord which is a few years old but 10k more than my mazda has more noticeable engine vibration at idle and more engine vibration when accelerating hard. (possibly just the difference in oil filled vs non oil filled engine mounts). road and suspension noise is less than the mazda, mostly suspension noise. but at 30k more it still has the odd creek here and there from this plastic piece or another.

i have a few rattles in my car right now and a few minor ones that i have taken care of. on of them was when it got cold i had a slight metallic buzzing rattle under/ beside the steering column. the root cause of this was actually the rx wore for the remote starter was sitting around those metal hoops beside the steering column and would rattle when they get cold; this was solved by just taping it up and immobilizing it. the second i had was the passenger door, the solution to this was pulling off the door panel and tightening the screws the join the upper and lower parts of the panel. the third rattle is the glove box. it rattles over bumps and its the slack in the door, solution: im going to install a bit of weather stripping to tighten things up.

the last rattle i have, mostly over bigger bumps, is the trunk panels bump around. this doesnt bother me too much but the noise can probably be eliminated by butting some extra foam between all the interfaces.

[matt9]

Heh, the noise I was referring to was mostly minor interior noise. You have mysterious front seat squeeks, squeeky seatbelt connectors, pretty much the entire plastic center console/dash at some place or another, the glove compartment etc..

[howitts_done]

18,000 km later I still have the same vibrating/creaking sound coming from my arm rest; I will try the weather stripping. In terms of other noises it is VERY quite. The only other noise I hear is from the glove compartment every once and awhile.

[matt9]

Good news.. I think. I was playing around with the drivers seat (adjusting it and so forth), I decided to raise it up a bit and the driver squeek is gone. Just by rising the seat a bit, the squeek when from COMPLETELY annoying to essenitally gone.