[SOLVED] Trying to ferret out a cold vibrating noise in the engine bay

[CanadianGuy]

I have a vibrating noise in the engine bay when the car is cold. Almost sounds like the hood prop when not in the holder. I have eliminated it by taking it out. Only occurs at low rpm and well too dark and cold in the morning to hunt down. It is not the shifter as moving the shifter around does not change or make the sound go away. Changing the rpm does.

One thing I noticed tonight was the I can move the radiator front to back almost 1 inch. I do so by pushing and pulling with little pressure on the AC filler tube. I don't have another FiST to check if this is normal. Can anyone check there's ?

I have notices that the windshield cowl has a spot that touches the strut bar which may be the cause. I have added padding to it to see if tomorrow it goes away. Still concerned about the rad moving so much.


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UPDATE it was the engine cover not fully seated on all pegs hitting the strut bar.

 

[CallmeTurbo]

Its funny that you said your having this problem because up until about 2 hours ago i was having that too. A vibrating noise that made a squeaking noise too only when the car got warmed up and idled down to 750. if i revved to 1k it would stop. I put slight pressure on the rad just like u and it stopped all together. It took me and my dad checking it for several days trying to figure it out and FINALLY got it. Me and him had just done a Intercooler upgrade and changed the factory pipes as well and turns out the Intercooler pipe was slightly rubbing on the fan grill. So when we pushed the rad it pushed the fan cover back and thats when it would stop momentarily. So we got a dremel and cut a groove for the pipe. I'm not sure if that will help you but I figured i would share so that way you could atleast try and pinpoint that sucker!

 

[CanadianGuy]

Thanks. Will look closer at the rad. Have not done any work near it for a while (IC, BM, splitter) was done a long time ago.

 

[CanadianGuy]

UPDATE Solved!!!

Finally figured it out. It was the engine cover hitting the strut bar. The rear post near the back of the engine bay was not engaged and flapping around. Found this when I replaced the spark plugs this weekend.