There's a noise coming from the undercarriage of my car. When in gear (any), and applying the slightest of throttle (1cm worth?), a feint mechanical grinding sound occurs. More throttle makes the sound go away. What could it be?

Noticed it the last 2k miles. Car has 22k. Clutch fluid, Tranny fluid, has been done within the last 2k. I'm positive I did the fluids correctly.

Any ideas?

 

can you pin point the noise? does it happen in neutral when you apply throttle?

 

I'll have to check after work. What other info would you need? I'll try to get a soundbyte later tonight.

 

Could it just be the famous clutch deceleration noise?

"More throttle makes the sound go away" is a dead giveaway to me...I know he says "1 cm" of throttle, so I dunno... Perhaps he's got 1 cm of freeplay and he's not really on the gas? 1 cm is not much...

Are you actually accelerating? If you're in gear but not on the gas (i.e. overrun), I'd guess it's your clutch springs vibrating. Many, many, many S2000s do this, there's a TSB for it.

It's nothing to worry about and not really worth fixing in a sense, but it's definitely irritating.

Dave

 

You are sitting next to the gearbox.
Your feet are next to the engine.
And the back of your seat is almost above the rear wheels (diff).

Did you notice a huge change in sound recently?

It could very well be normal mechanical driveline / engine noise.
IMO pulling away in a higher gear from relative low revs gives a lot of normal mechanical noise.

A soundbite may help

 

Not really. Audible with the top up but feignt. Does not happen in neutral. Can hear it in 3rd gear and above, probably happens in 2nd but it is barely noticable.



I wouldn't say I was "accelerating". More like "maintaing/slowing down deceleration".

It's been there for a while I guess, it's just lately that I've been noticing it more. The easiest way I can replicate a close sound is when the clutch is 95% let out, and 2% on throttle. But that's when it's REALLY audible.

Soundbyte is going to be hard, besides cabin noise, i'm not sure my recording device can pick it up.

For some reason I think it's the fuelpump being starved with such little throttle. But I have no idea.

 

I'm going with the common "clutch deceleration noise" here... sounds kinda like a leaf blower when you're in gear but not on the gas, especially around 3-4Kish RPM? Goes away as soon as you get back on the gas (i.e. accelerate) or depress the clutch?

It's the clutch vibrating - look up Honda's TSB.

Either way, it's doing no harm. You can either learn to live with it or replace the clutch. (or drown it out with mods!)

Dave