Strange humming sound?

[chylld]

Ok i've got a very annoying sound in my car that's only recently started to develop. Car is an 06 civic sedan.

When driving along, I get this kind of humming/resonance sound happening. With the help of some software i've narrowed the frequency of the sound to 275hz; it's very distinctly a single tone.

Here are the clues:

• As i drive faster, it gets louder.
• On rough surfaces, it presents itself more.
• The pitch does not change, regardless of how fast I'm driving.
• It still happens when the stereo is turned off.
• I wound all the windows (inc. sunroof) down/up again and that didn't fix it.
• The sound is present throughout the tyre pressure range of 35-39psi
• (possibly unrelated) When i go over harsh bumps, i can hear something loose hitting the underside of the car with a metallic sound.

Any ideas anyone??

[Kakashi]

Originally Posted by chylld

Ok i've got a very annoying sound in my car that's only recently started to develop. Car is an 06 civic sedan.

When driving along, I get this kind of humming/resonance sound happening. With the help of some software i've narrowed the frequency of the sound to 275hz; it's very distinctly a single tone.

Here are the clues:

• As i drive faster, it gets louder.
• On rough surfaces, it presents itself more.
• The pitch does not change, regardless of how fast I'm driving.
• It still happens when the stereo is turned off.
• I wound all the windows (inc. sunroof) down/up again and that didn't fix it.
• The sound is present throughout the tyre pressure range of 35-39psi
• (possibly unrelated) When i go over harsh bumps, i can hear something loose hitting the underside of the car with a metallic sound.

Any ideas anyone??

+1 for the Hz software rundown. Thats pretty smart, i know what 275 hz sounds like, but i really couldnt tell ya what it could be.

Probably suspension issue, get it checked

[peliROJO]

[*]As i drive faster, it gets louder. - my AUX jack does this
[*](possibly unrelated) When i go over harsh bumps, i can hear something loose hitting the underside of the car with a metallic sound. - Sounds like the right front metal clanging issue (multiple threads on this and I have it too)



Your problem is quite strange. A 275Hz sound when the stereo is turned off. Can you record it and post here?

[chylld]

a mechanical issue would probably make sense. at this stage i'm just trying to keep the facts as straight as possible and not come to any premature conclusions, but i have to admit that something mechanical (like a bearing) gone loose would make a non-dissimilar sound at speed.

peli: my civic has no aux jack; doesn't even have the aux harness behind the centre console

the metal clanging issue would definitely be worth a look into though.

what's strange is i've noticed that while the general tyre roar / road noise has been subdued a bit (thanks to dynamat and ensolite), the sharp shocks/bumps are much louder than i ever remember them being. a loose engine mount/similar would explain the sharp audible signals i get over bumps.

i don't have a good microphone, but i'll charge up the dv camera and hopefully get some useful audio on that.

[peliROJO]

I never had that claning sound until about 20,000 miles and since then it seems to be much worse, to the point where I'm about to call the Service Manager.

[chylld]

i just spent 4 hours on the road after fixing my rattling passenger seat... the first hour was the best, finally no more rattle!!! but the next 3 hours was agony, as it brought the engine mount clanging noise and this mysterious humming sound to the forefront

i've gotten hold of a voice recorder and will try to use it tomorrow to record the sound. one very interesting thing that i noticed, is when i run over ruts and potholes in the road, the 'thud' sound i'm hearing is exactly the same frequency as the humming sound. and because of its aural characteristics and that it's always a single pitch, i think it's just some panel or part that's resonating... which is very fixable.

i'm actually thinking, this might be a positive sign of my sound deadening... it's reduced resonance noises from so many panels that there are only a few distinct ones left... but unfortunately because they are distinct, they stand out like sore thumbs same kinda phenomenon as quietening your pc... eliminate your noisest part, and the next noisiest part becomes your biggest problem.

[chylld]

ok i did a recordng but unfortunately couldn't find a peak around 220-275hz... very frustrating, because i know i can hear it!! aargh.

don't know what to do now. the road noise is ridiculous and i've returned the car back to as stock form as possible, save ripping all the dynamat out. is it possible that adding dynamat actually increased my noise level??

[CaliGuy]

Or it could be the infamous tuning fork stuck in the dash issue?

[chylld]

Originally Posted by CaliGuy

Or it could be the infamous tuning fork stuck in the dash issue?

sounds a bit like that actually... when it happens, the noise sounds like a tuning fork, but at about 220hz.

but no there's no tuning fork in my dash.

[DanielAcosta]

Originally Posted by chylld

Ok i've got a very annoying sound in my car that's only recently started to develop. Car is an 06 civic sedan.

When driving along, I get this kind of humming/resonance sound happening. With the help of some software i've narrowed the frequency of the sound to 275hz; it's very distinctly a single tone.

Here are the clues:

• As i drive faster, it gets louder.
• On rough surfaces, it presents itself more.
• The pitch does not change, regardless of how fast I'm driving.
• It still happens when the stereo is turned off.
• I wound all the windows (inc. sunroof) down/up again and that didn't fix it.
• The sound is present throughout the tyre pressure range of 35-39psi
• (possibly unrelated) When i go over harsh bumps, i can hear something loose hitting the underside of the car with a metallic sound.

Any ideas anyone??

How many miles on the car? Did you recently change tires or put new ones on? If not, how much life is left in the original tires?

Reason I ask is near the end of the tread life of my stock Bridgestones, they didn't get noisy but started to vibrate pretty bad. Since they only lasted 33,000 miles, I wanted to try something different and not put Bridgestones back on again.

The first set of replacement tires I put on sounded terrible, and almost exactly like what you have described in your thread. I then switched to Yokohama YK520's, and my humming noise from the tires went away.

[chylld]

i'm currently on the original tires (bridgestone turanza er30), and i've only done 5300 miles so far. they have plenty of tread left.

now that i think about it, the tires could well be to blame, however it does not account for the fact that when i hit a bump, i get a resonance sound of the same frequency as the humming.

my tires are very loud in my opinion, but i'm also hearing a LOT of 'exterior' road noise, e.g. when i run over small joins in the road, i can hear them a lot more than i can feel them... to the point where it's embarassingly loud going over certain roads so i avoid them when i have passengers.

another big noise problem i have is when pulling up to a stop... my car just keeps on roaring as if to say "aaargh i'm stopping raa hear me stop i'm so noisy aaargh"

[peliROJO]

My car was extremely noisy also. I sound dampened most of the vehicle and switched to Goodyear Comfortreads. I'm not sure how much the dampening did because it was a process that took a few hours a night over several days. I think those Turanza's were about to make me go crazy. I'm very much happy the way it is now.

[chylld]

yeah, one of the things i wish i did was take noise recordings before and after... i did mine too incrementally as well to notice any big imporovement.

would you say that changing tires helped more than SD?

[peliROJO]

I would say this:

I'm very skeptical of everything. I'm pessimistic. I'd try not to have a good time, or enjoy a product more than I should. I've always laughed at people who got drunk off non-alcoholic beer or high off parsley. That said...

I drove for weeks listening specifically to the sound, normally I'd just be zoned out listening to whatever. I felt the floor was screaming. I mentioned it to others riding with me. I finally couldn't focus on anything but the road drone coming from the floor.

I did SD on the floor and trunk in one night. The next day I couldn't hear the droning but I could hear awful road and wind noise from the doors and windows. I did the doors with various stages of SD over weeks. One door at a time for each of the three stages. It was exhaustive, probably more so than the 14 hours spent on the floor. I noticed nothing over those weeks.

Afterwards I remember hearing what I thought was wind noise from the windows or maybe from the roof. I also have a sunroof and joked about filling it in with foam. There was wind noise from what I can remember. However, I don't remember hearing any in the last month or two. I'm probably just not focusing on it.

But, there was road noise and it was loud. Really loud. I hated my tires. I wanted to SD the wheel wells and get new tires. I could hear the engine too.

I finally got the Comfortreads last week, probably driven a few hundred miles in them. The road noise is much less. I can still hear the engine when flooring it and some other times. But, I've found myself just sitting in awe when rolling to a stop. The car is quite. Almost like it's off. Then I'll pull into the parking spot and just listen with the radio off and I like it. When you turn the car off you notice that it was on but that's the same difference between outside during the day and night. Nighttime is always quieter even though daytime seems quiet.

Gosh, that's the most typing I've done since high school. I hope it was worth something.

[BigBucksT]

Holy **** I thought I was the only one. I have an EX coupe, and when i go over a speedbump it sounds and feels like a cable is falling off my car. I can also feel it in the pedal like it is rubbing against the floor. WTF is this and am I in danger??????

[chylld]

Originally Posted by peliROJO

...

right, either it's something about these civics or we just happen to think exactly the same!

whenever i drive around, my mind and ears are constantly focused on the road noise, analysing what type of noise it is, why it's happening, and quite agonisingly, why is the road noise so much noisier than even my friends' cars that are 10-15 years older? i think.. is it the tyre size/profile? no, my girlfriend's dad's accord has the same size tyres and is practically silent. maybe the panel metal's thinner? yes, but i've added 2 layers of dynamat almost everywhere! is it the door seals? but there are dual door seals...

i have to stress that this is my thinking now, after about 50lbs of sound deadening and ensolite. back when i had only owned the car for a few weeks, it was already at the point that i felt justified handing the dealership another AU$500 to spray the underbody of my car with deadening.

it helped, a bit, maybe.. or it could've just been a placebo effect. when i started my civic sound deadening, i got in touch with other drivers of the same model civic so we could do some side-by-side noise level tests once i'd finished... now i'm too afraid to even do that, to think that 4 weekends and $AU1300 has been all for nothing..or even, made it worse...

so that's the kind of thinking i've been going through. at home i have some newly-bought wax/grease remover and underbody deadening bought from the local auto shop, i've yet to put it on yet... although those wheel wells are looking mighty tempting. and yes i've also thought of stuffing foam in between the sunroof glass and sliding panel.

and of course i've wanted to get new tyres, but after reading all these reports of the ER30's being "exceptionally quiet" i hastily concluded that the tyres weren't the problem; reading your post has probably inched me away from insanity just enough to consider a rational course of action you would probably be one of the few people to understand how relieved i am to hear that changing to quiet tyres on our cars can get rid of the racket.

[chylld]

ack i've done a search, and unfortunately, the goodyear assurance comfortreds aren't available in australia... probably because they're an all-season tyre, and the market for snow-capable tyres down here is next to zilch. (tire is spelt "tyre" in australia, btw.) at least i know where to target, though!

Originally Posted by BigBucksT

Holy **** I thought I was the only one. I have an EX coupe, and when i go over a speedbump it sounds and feels like a cable is falling off my car. I can also feel it in the pedal like it is rubbing against the floor. WTF is this and am I in danger??????

does it sound like a metallic kind of sound, similar to the sound your aircon makes when it's turning on?

[BigBucksT]

Originally Posted by chylld

does it sound like a metallic kind of sound, similar to the sound your aircon makes when it's turning on?

Yes

[chylld]

Originally Posted by BigBucksT

Yes

there's a chance it might be the upper right engine mount problem quite a lot of us are having, you can read more about it here.

[peliROJO]

Of course, I drove an extra 30 miles tonight just to listen some more. There is still tire drone at 55-75. I'll have to check again but somewhere below 35mph and the sound disappears. This has to be a product of this particular tire. The noise overall is less with the new tires but it's far from perfect. Wheel well and underbody sound deadening sounds great.

I'm taking the car in tomorrow to have the service center look at the metallic clanging on the front right. Thanks for posting that link because I need to read up on it some more.