Wind buffeting in cabin

BlacknTan

BlacknTan

New member
Okay, here's something I've never encountered before.
We travel with dogs in the back. The often like the window open, so I crack the rear door window a couple of inches. At highway speeds, this creates a terrible wind drumming noise if the front windows are closed or only slightly open. It is very annoying!

Anyone else with a 5th Gen notice this, or have a cure?
 
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BlacknTan said:
Okay, here's something I've never encountered before.
We travel with dogs in the back. The often like the window open, so I crack the rear door window a couple of inches. At highway speeds, this creates a terrible wind drumming noise if the front windows are closed or only slightly open. It is very annoying!

Anyone else with a 5th Gen notice this, or have a cure?
Click to expand...

Yes it happens and it has happened in every vehicle I have ever owned. Not 4Runner exclusive. The cure is to open another window at the same time. Problem solved.
 
I too have experience this on every vehicle I have ever owned.

I find it convenient to crack the rear window while venting the sun roof. This way the passengers do not get cold from their own window being down but you allow air flow and eliminate the buffeting.
 
We have a 2014 and it does the same thing. It's bad enough to the point we can't crack the windows when driving with our kids in the back seat because the wind noise is too annoying.
 
I vent the roof and open the back window some. No buffeting even at highway speeds. Give that a try.
 
I don't remember it too much when I was a kid. But in the last 15 years? Yea, every single car I've ever ridden in seems to have this lovely feature. It'll give you a damn migraine. Open another window, equalize the pressure, and then it's tolerable.
 
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Thanks for all the replies, but to be honest, this is the first rig ever that I have noticed this... but, it's the first vehicle with 4 doors and full windows in those doors that I've owned in a good long while.

I'll have to try it in my wife's 4 door Accord... Dogs rarely ride in that.
 
If you have a moonroof then you can set it to tilt open and that normally does the trick. You may have to fiddle with the rear window a bit too.
 
BlacknTan said:
Thanks for all the replies, but to be honest, this is the first rig ever that I have noticed this... but, it's the first vehicle with 4 doors and full windows in those doors that I've owned in a good long while.

I'll have to try it in my wife's 4 door Accord... Dogs rarely ride in that.
Click to expand...

While driving the Accord, put the back two windows down entirely while leaving the front two windows completely up. You'll hear an extremely loud low frequency rumble. It's the magic of acoustics and physics.
 
BlacknTan said:
Okay, here's something I've never encountered before.
We travel with dogs in the back. The often like the window open, so I crack the rear door window a couple of inches. At highway speeds, this creates a terrible wind drumming noise if the front windows are closed or only slightly open. It is very annoying!

Anyone else with a 5th Gen notice this, or have a cure?
Click to expand...

[MENTION=120065]BlacknTan[/MENTION] ,

I posted this back in 2014. http://www.toyota-4runner.org/5th-gen-t4rs/180355-strange-vibration-wind-noise.html
I had the same experience.

I know some people have reported that "all vehicles" they owned did this, and that very well may be true. I have owned many sedans from 65 Malibu SS 2 doors to Lincoln Town cars and had never experienced this in those vehicles.
Trucks owned only had windows that would crack open on the rear of the window...so I guess, I never received that effect.

First SUV, so it was quite a surprise when it happened.
 
Saker said:
[MENTION=120065]BlacknTan[/MENTION] ,

I posted this back in 2014. http://www.toyota-4runner.org/5th-gen-t4rs/180355-strange-vibration-wind-noise.html
I had the same experience.

I know some people have reported that "all vehicles" they owned did this, and that very well may be true. I have owned many sedans from 65 Malibu SS 2 doors to Lincoln Town cars and had never experienced this in those vehicles.
Trucks owned only had windows that would crack open on the rear of the window...so I guess, I never received that effect.

First SUV, so it was quite a surprise when it happened.
Click to expand...

It's called Helmholtz resonance. It is similar to blowing across the open end of a bottle. The deep resonance "buffeting" noise you hear is due to the large volume of air (big space) in the 4Runner. Smaller volumes will equal a higher resonant sound. The amount of the window being down will change the pitch and frequency.
Yes, all vehicles do it but the severity depends on the window shape, the distance the window is open, the shape of the window, the age of the vehicle (new vehicles are much more airtight and hence more susceptible to this effect) and a host of other variables. Anybody who knows a bit about sub woofers should recognize this. It is very simply stopped by opening another window (port) slightly to allow a vent.

I didn't say all this in my first post because, well, science, physics and engineering usually makes people's eye's glaze over.
 
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I think 1engineer nailed it. My Wrangler 4dr, XJ Cherokees, VW Golf, wife's Mazda 5, Suburbans, etc. all buffeted terribly with only the rear windows down. Can't say I remember experiencing it in "the old days", but I always drove 2-doors until I had a family.
 
Thanks for all the helpful replies, and to my friend [MENTION=103267]Saker[/MENTION] for pointing me to the other thread ( I honestly tried a search before posting this!).

Like Saker, I've never noticably experienced this before, but my experiences seems to have mirrored his pretty closely.

And BTW, in my truck it takes more than just cracking the front window to relieve the pressure on my sensitive eardrums ... tough when driving through freezing rain like we had last week!
 
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