New member w/ unicorn & question

Hey there, new member, long time lurker. This is a great site with a wealth of knowledge and talented people. Much appreciated. I enjoy the humor as much as the learning.

A few months ago, I purchased a 2022 Tacoma Sport Access Cab 4x4 with the 6MT. I needed the long bed and wanted to get a truck with a manual transmission before they became obsolete. I plan to keep it mostly stock and have installed a bed mat, better shift knob and I have an ARE CX canopy on order that I need. Before winter I plan to purchase better AT tires but for now, I am OK with the Toyo's A30's it came with.

The photo is from mid-April, the truck was only a couple weeks old at the time.

Before purchasing the truck, I took it for a fairly long test drive and knew most of the quirks and shortcomings beforehand. I am OK with the truck for the most part, but not overly enthusiastic. For the record, I have owned many different makes of trucks with manual transmissions and years ago I owned a Gen 1. We currently have a 2009 Camry in our household, so I am somewhat familiar with Toyota. Most of my driving are two lane roads where speed varies from 45-65 MPH. The highlight of owning this truck so far has been the fuel mileage where I have been averaging 22-23 MPG.

The issue and question I have is the interior. After about the first 1000-1500 miles, quite a few rattles and squeaks developed. I am disappointed and my wife even commented about it and said relative to our old Camry with 225K miles, the Tacoma is not as solid. I live on a smooth gravel road and the rattles drive me nuts. I do not hear them as much when on the asphalt, but they do occur if I drive over railroad tracks, rumble strips, etc.

The most annoying of them is the loose and ticking sound I hear coming from the access cab doors, right around the handle shown in the photo. The driver side is worse than the passenger side but they both make the noise. I have not removed the panel (yet) but, I have tried tightening things, adding tape and pads to the door latches, etc. It is definitely inside the panel and if I reach back and put pressure on the handle as I am driving, the noise goes away. I also noticed the noise is less likely to occur the hotter it is outside and if the truck sits in the sun for a while.

The dealer is an hour drive away and I have little confidence they will acknowledge or address this issue to my satisfaction. On a scale of 1 to 10, I would put my mechanical abilities and experience working on vehicles at a solid 7 and would rather try to fix this myself.

I have door clips and sound deadening material on order and as much as I hate to remove the door panels on a new truck, I can't tolerate the ticking noise any longer. Have any of you experienced this, have ideas or suggestions on what it could be and how to repair it? Any helpful tips or comments are appreciated. Thanks.

 

Really nice looking truck! Welcome aboard!

First thing to do is, tuck that wallet away real tight, cause this place will drain it for you.

Now that door panel is totally hollow inside with no sound deadening at all. I have taken the panels off both sides, and covered the metal inside both doors with Dynamat. Tend not to hear too much now. More than likely your when you take it apart, you will either coverup your issue and not notice it any more, or you will find a loose clip or something. Good luck! And enjoy your truck!

 

Welcome to Tacoma World and congrats on the new truck. She’s a beaut.
I can’t help you too much with your exact problem but I will add that I’ve owned 8 Toyotas over the last 20 years and traded in a 2012 Tundra that was smooth, quiet and bullet proof. The Tacoma in comparison is like the snarky, mouthy, grating little brother that gets away with everything because it’s lovable. It took me months of placing felt and duct seal in strategic places to quiet the rattling from the door panels, window switches and dash speaker grates/A pillars.
The wheel wells rattle, the bed storage compartments rattle…yea. It’s a completely different animal compared to the Tundra, Camry, Highlander’s, and 4Runner we have owned. Get used to hearing “oh that’s normal for a Tacoma”. Sorry but the reply came across far more negative than I intended. It’s a charming truck in its own way and I’m still getting 22-23 MPG’s like you. Good luck

 

I have owned my Taco for 1.5yrs now, and I too have a door rattle. I've had it since day one. It's just something I live with because it doesn't bother me that much. It's the drivers door - front door. Other doors may rattle, but I don't sit close enough to them to hear it. It's the exact same place as yours. In the handle where you pull the door closed.

It happens if I play the stereo really loud and the song has bass in it or if I drive on a rough road. I can hear something shaking or vibrating in the door. But if I lightly squeeze the door handle, it stops and all is well.

 

Welcome!

After thousands of miles on washboard roads, my Taco rattles just about everywhere...so I just turn the music up louder

 

I’ve had lots of tacomas and access cabs. The access cabs rattle the most. Hard plastics and not very much sound deadening. Probably lots to do with the suicide doors on all of them. Dealer won’t do jack I’m guessing. I’ve just become so used to it it doesn’t bother me. But I’m not like most people. I like the little quirks these trucks have and all the squeaks and rattles. Makes me feel like I’m back in the truck with my grandfather in his old Toyota pickup. My last few 5th gen 4Runners are so quiet you could hear a pin drop. No rattles whatsoever.

 

Thank you for the replies. I plan to tackle this in the next week or two. If I find a cause, I will take a photo and update the thread.

 

I have owned many Tacomas 93-98-04-08-21 over the year and never had issues with noise like mentioned above maybe my hearing is bad. Just saying

 

Welcome to TW!

 

I have similar concerns on my 2020 SR AC. Interested to see what you find, as I do not have the knowledge or equipment to try and tackle this myself.

 

Unidentified noise management classes?

On a more serious note, I’m sorry to say that these unidentified noise threads rarely have a resolution.

 

10K. No noises.

 

None?! You must be deaf! Lol

 

What? Did you say something??? Hello?

 

My unidentified noise experiences:

- the first time I started it at -15F it let out an awful screech that I guess was a belt slipping
- after having my passenger side doors replaced I had a rattle that lasted 3 days and then mysteriously went away
- the 6mt makes an audible clanking sound when shifted unlike any of my other manual transmissions
- odd popping sounds when applying the brakes shortly after starting (drum brakes warming up?)
- others I can’t remember

On the bright side, I have never heard the high pressure fuel pump noise or the whining rear diff.

This is not so different than every automobile I’ve owned.

 

I think the worse sound I ever heard my taco make was after I got it buried beyond the frame in gravely mud and got winched out. The sound of the rocks grinding away my brakes made me cringe.

 

I noticed that my passenger seat rattles at certain highway speeds, which is incredibly annoying on road trips. At first I thought it was the coins in my center console organizer tray, which caused me to dump the tray and its contents, but it was the stupid seat. Time to undo the girlfriend delete mod.

 

I also have an access cab and often get a ticking sound right near my ear. If I apply pressure to the top corner of the access cab door, it stops. But holding the door isn’t a sustainable solution, obviously. I have pulled the door panel a couple times. With the panel off, the rattle is gone. I’ve felt taped a few places without improvement. My guess now is that the little red clips that secure the door panel just don’t quite do the job well enough, especially because the access cab doors have more movement compared with the double cab doors that close onto a more solid frame. I think I’m hearing those clips moving and rattling as the door moves. Good call on ordering extra clips. You will likely need a couple. My local parts department gave me the wrong clips initially. You need the red clips, like the ones for the overhead console. Good luck and I’m interested in what you learn.

 

As for rattles and squeaks, check your U Bolts. Initially 3rd Gens were delivered with them under torqued.

https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads/check-your-u-bolts.397913/

 

My 2016 SR Access Cab was displaying an inordinate amount of door rattling and shaking. I diligently made sure to give the access doors (anchor doors for closure) a really robust shove to close, I replaced the small rubber bumper cushions that made contact between the front and access doors, to little avail. Then a couple months ago...I heard a small metal pinging noise as I closed the driver side rear access door and observed that a small metric retaining bolt with a flanged, star-drive head had fallen from the bottom of the door to my garage floor. I peeked underneath the access door and observed that it was one of three such bolts holding the lower door internal latch assembly in place. The other two were quite loose. The opposite side door was the same, but one was missing. I ordered the exact right bolt from my dealer soon after (about a dollar or two), and carefully uninstalled, locktited, and reinstalled with proper torque the three affected latch bolts for each access door underside. Pretty much solved my rattles and now I don't need to slam doors, which probably loosened the bolts to begin with. Sometimes the machine will reveal the solution to you with a subtle clue. Until the bolt hit the garage floor, I never thought to look up at the underside of the access doors. Hope this might help all you access cab drivers.