Sacrilicious
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- Cosmic Blue MS3 of hawtness!
Confirmation on the MS3 windshield cowl fix.
Ok, so many of us have had this problem:
As the weather gets colder, you notice that the plastic windshield cowl that sits on top of our windshield right at the base of the windshield wipers rubs up against the windshield and creates an IRRITATING creaking noise as you drive around. Initially, I thought that this was actually coming from inside the cabin, but it REALLY didn't make any sense, because no matter what panel I pushed down on, nothing helped! After reading a post by Dread, I got the rundown on his fix for it: put electric tape along the underside of the cowl in order to stop this annoying creaking! Here's a quick lowdown on what happened when I tried to fix this thing:
I'd like to apologize in advance for not having pictures as I write this, but I promise I will take some pics and write up a more thorough how-to in the How-To section later on this week and link that thread into here. Ok, onto the good stuff:
At first, I was lazy and tried to half-ass things by only unscrewing the two screws that screw the top of the cowl down to the windshield and taking ~2" strips of electrical tape and just doing a spotty job of things and only taping portions of the cowl. This, obviously, was a stupid idea and born of laziness...it did NOT work...=/
Next, I got cute with my laziness and decided that wouldn't it be GREAT if I just stuck these handy little felt pads onto the cowl every 6" or so? Ya, you guessed it: not only was this going to make it easier for water to leak down under the cowl, but it did NOT work! (bang)
Finally, it was freakin COLD out, and as you will notice, this creak only gets worse as it gets colder (colder plastic = stiffer plastic = MORE CREAKS!!!), so I just bit the bullet and went ahead and did this up the RIGHT way. I unscrewed my windshield wipers and put them to the side. Then I took out the two screws on top of the cowl out and moved on to the engine bay. In here, you have to remove a strip of rubber insulation which holds the backside of the cowl in place inside the engine bay. After this, you have to disconnect the tube that feeds windshield wiper fluid to the cowl assembly (which includes your fluid spray nozzles). After this, you have to carefully unhook the backside of the cowl from the windshield. This is where you have to be VERY careful about things, because the plastic bracing hooks that hold the cowl against the windshield are not the toughest things in the world. I will give more cautionary details when I post the full How-To later on this week. After this, the cowl should finally be removable and completely separable from your car.
After I had the cowl in hand, I took it upstairs and carefully cleaned it off with Windex. As soon as it was good and dry, I applied electrical tape in one single strip across each half of the cowl (yes, it's actually two pieces that lock together to form a whole). I made sure to superglue the ends of the tape so that it would be less likely to come loose. I was also very careful as I applied the tape so that it was definitely flush with the edge of the cowl. Then, I repeated this process 3x more so that I had a whopping 4 layers of electrical tape to protect myself against the creak. Yes, I'm freakin paranoid at this point, because I do NOT want to repeat this process anytime soon, and I sure as HELL can't stand this creaking anymore! (bang) After I was done with the tape, I also stuck felt pads all over the underside of the cowl to make sure that there would not be any sort of unwanted vibration against the edge of the windshield after I put it back in.
When all these added layers of protection were put in, I went to put the cowl back onto my car. This is where things got sloppy and I managed to snap/bend a few of the snaps and plastic hooks that hold things in place. You have to be VERY careful when putting this back on, so be very cautious as you line the cowl up and carefully feed the plastic hooks that latch underneath the windshield into place. After you get them into position, you're going to have to carefully, but firmly push it into place and then rescrew everything back into place.
I obviously cut out some of the annoying details from the reinstallation of the cowl out due to lack of pictures, but like I said, I'll be posting a full How-To later this week with pictures and diagrams. I, personally, really really hated this creak, so even though it's going to take me a long-ass time to write up this How-To, I really think it's worth it for people who would like to do this themselves and fix things up nicely. The alternative, of course, is to simply take it back to the dealer and have them spray adhesive foam into there, but I really wanted to see this through myself, and I am happy to report that there are NO creaks coming from my cowl now. In fact, the only annoying noises I hear are coming from my rear suspension, and I believe that to be because of either loosened sway bar bushing nuts, or a simple need for grease back there. This, of course, will be my next project, and I'll tell you guys how that goes when I get it taken care of! (alright)
Please post if you have anything to add about this issue, because unless I'm a complete freak, I don't think I'm alone in my frustration with this problem. Happy tinkering, all! (drinks)
Ok, so many of us have had this problem:
As the weather gets colder, you notice that the plastic windshield cowl that sits on top of our windshield right at the base of the windshield wipers rubs up against the windshield and creates an IRRITATING creaking noise as you drive around. Initially, I thought that this was actually coming from inside the cabin, but it REALLY didn't make any sense, because no matter what panel I pushed down on, nothing helped! After reading a post by Dread, I got the rundown on his fix for it: put electric tape along the underside of the cowl in order to stop this annoying creaking! Here's a quick lowdown on what happened when I tried to fix this thing:
I'd like to apologize in advance for not having pictures as I write this, but I promise I will take some pics and write up a more thorough how-to in the How-To section later on this week and link that thread into here. Ok, onto the good stuff:
At first, I was lazy and tried to half-ass things by only unscrewing the two screws that screw the top of the cowl down to the windshield and taking ~2" strips of electrical tape and just doing a spotty job of things and only taping portions of the cowl. This, obviously, was a stupid idea and born of laziness...it did NOT work...=/
Next, I got cute with my laziness and decided that wouldn't it be GREAT if I just stuck these handy little felt pads onto the cowl every 6" or so? Ya, you guessed it: not only was this going to make it easier for water to leak down under the cowl, but it did NOT work! (bang)
Finally, it was freakin COLD out, and as you will notice, this creak only gets worse as it gets colder (colder plastic = stiffer plastic = MORE CREAKS!!!), so I just bit the bullet and went ahead and did this up the RIGHT way. I unscrewed my windshield wipers and put them to the side. Then I took out the two screws on top of the cowl out and moved on to the engine bay. In here, you have to remove a strip of rubber insulation which holds the backside of the cowl in place inside the engine bay. After this, you have to disconnect the tube that feeds windshield wiper fluid to the cowl assembly (which includes your fluid spray nozzles). After this, you have to carefully unhook the backside of the cowl from the windshield. This is where you have to be VERY careful about things, because the plastic bracing hooks that hold the cowl against the windshield are not the toughest things in the world. I will give more cautionary details when I post the full How-To later on this week. After this, the cowl should finally be removable and completely separable from your car.
After I had the cowl in hand, I took it upstairs and carefully cleaned it off with Windex. As soon as it was good and dry, I applied electrical tape in one single strip across each half of the cowl (yes, it's actually two pieces that lock together to form a whole). I made sure to superglue the ends of the tape so that it would be less likely to come loose. I was also very careful as I applied the tape so that it was definitely flush with the edge of the cowl. Then, I repeated this process 3x more so that I had a whopping 4 layers of electrical tape to protect myself against the creak. Yes, I'm freakin paranoid at this point, because I do NOT want to repeat this process anytime soon, and I sure as HELL can't stand this creaking anymore! (bang) After I was done with the tape, I also stuck felt pads all over the underside of the cowl to make sure that there would not be any sort of unwanted vibration against the edge of the windshield after I put it back in.
When all these added layers of protection were put in, I went to put the cowl back onto my car. This is where things got sloppy and I managed to snap/bend a few of the snaps and plastic hooks that hold things in place. You have to be VERY careful when putting this back on, so be very cautious as you line the cowl up and carefully feed the plastic hooks that latch underneath the windshield into place. After you get them into position, you're going to have to carefully, but firmly push it into place and then rescrew everything back into place.
I obviously cut out some of the annoying details from the reinstallation of the cowl out due to lack of pictures, but like I said, I'll be posting a full How-To later this week with pictures and diagrams. I, personally, really really hated this creak, so even though it's going to take me a long-ass time to write up this How-To, I really think it's worth it for people who would like to do this themselves and fix things up nicely. The alternative, of course, is to simply take it back to the dealer and have them spray adhesive foam into there, but I really wanted to see this through myself, and I am happy to report that there are NO creaks coming from my cowl now. In fact, the only annoying noises I hear are coming from my rear suspension, and I believe that to be because of either loosened sway bar bushing nuts, or a simple need for grease back there. This, of course, will be my next project, and I'll tell you guys how that goes when I get it taken care of! (alright)
Please post if you have anything to add about this issue, because unless I'm a complete freak, I don't think I'm alone in my frustration with this problem. Happy tinkering, all! (drinks)
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) and I had wondered if it is something I could have the dealer take a look at.
