I just finished deadening my rear hatchback door. I used FatMat and applied generously, because like someone else mentioned, all I heard rattle with my system was the rear door.
When others get around to doing this on their own vehicles,
make sure you disconnect the negative post from the battery before unplugging any wiring harnesses. Otherwise, you'll find that your electronic door handle and automatic closer won't work anymore, until they're reset.
Unlike HokieRunner, I didn't replace the plastic water shield with ABS plastic sheeting...it's just too expensive for the minor purpose it serves. Even Amazon and Ebay were about $10-12 (shipped) for one 12"x12" square of 1/8" ABS plastic sheeting. Could not find any sheets locally either. When I come across some material that I feel will work, I'll replace the water shield and do like HokieRunner did to his 4 passenger doors.
Here's some pictures. I also removed the door handle assembly on the exterior (right above the license plate)...the thing with the logo and the license plate lights...and applied FatMat directly on the body of the car where that plastic assembly goes, but I didn't get a picture.
Before:
After:
In the picture above, you can see I removed the black plate on the right side of the "Before" picture, and let it hang by the wires. That allowed me to get behind it and apply FatMat on the inside part of the door. Behind the white box on the left side of the picture (which is where your manual release levers are located, btw), I applied two layers. It's the central area of the overall door.
Before: (and before it was cleaned)
After:
I also decided to line the majority of the inside of the plastic trim cover:
Effects after Installation
After installing, I noticed I was hearing new rattles in other places. Those new ones will be gone as I slowly cover the entire car. From the outside, bass is definitely quieter, and the loudest** thing rattling with the window rolled all the way up is the glass itself hitting vibrating metal. The metal that the window is contacting is in a very tight location which will make it hard to install FatMat.
The trunk feels solid when shutting the door. No more of that hollow shaking sound when closing. I can't wait until the rest of my car gives a nice solid thud.
**I have two Kicker Comp VR 12" powered by a Kenwood 9105D 1800W Mono amp. There is a lot of bass for the rear door to handle, and I'm not going to lie and say all the rattles in the rear door are gone. The window is the loudest source of rattling ONLY when it is rolled all the way up. I have found that rolling the window 1/4 the way down eliminates the glass hitting the metal and the horrible rattle noise that it makes. Even then, with the glass not contacting any metal, the rattling is there, but it is so faint. With the window rolled down, the loudest rattle is probably...the rear window wiper blade. :lmao: Besides the rear wiper blade, there are some rattles coming from both of the rear quarter panels, but I'll get to those at another time.
The rear door has so many objects in the way. It kind of sucked to do, and required several small pieces. Overall, it took me about 9 hours (cleaning, applying, testing).
Awesome write up. Very Detailed. But...
What did you use on the tailgate? I'm assuming FatMat?
I have a sub and the only thing that I ever hear rattle is the rear window, license plate, and rear panel.
Also, DynaMat suggests that their material blocks heat? Does FatMat and/or mastic peel & seal do this? That would be awesome because its about to be a hot ass summer in TX.
As for the license plate, I put a piece of sticky back foam that I bought from Michael's (arts and crafts store). It's cheap, ~ $1 for a 9"x12", perfect to make a license plate cutout from. There is absolutely NO rattling from the license plate, even at times when I can see the plate oscillating. The one piece stuck great for about 6 months, and it's just now starting to peel at the bottom edge. Alternatively, you
could apply FatMat, but I think the aluminum backing on the FatMat might cause a small noise. By the way, I don't use any license plate frames. They rattle like crazy.
Like I said above, the rear panel itself doesn't rattle too much. The loudest rattle is the glass itself, but ONLY when it's rolled up. When rolled all the way up, from the outside it sounds like a jackhammer nailing a steel beam. When rolled 1/4 of the way down, the jackhammer (glass on metal) sound is gone, and there's only slight panel vibration now.
Quote from FatMat:
"Our FatMat and RattleTrap products are constructed from premium acoustical sound dampening material and space age heat shielding material. With proper installation dramatic noise reductions as well as tremendous bass gains can be accomplished."
While the panels with FatMat installed themselves may not allow heat to pass through as much as before, it will not make your car cooler when left out in the sun. Even with tint on your windows, the sun's energy passes through your glass and is absorbed by materials inside the car. Theoretically, your seats can't be hotter than the air or any other material inside your car, which means that everything inside the car will try to balance out so it reaches thermal equilibrium. No matter what you do to your car, if left long enough in the sun, it WILL eventually surpass the temperature outside. The only thing any insulating material companies can claim is that they can reduce the
time it takes to for temperature to change. I think I'm right there with ya with the heat in Las Vegas, NV, if not worse! :wow2:
my factory head unit was partially defective anyways and I had a helluva good time sawing into that thing!)
arty:
