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Vibration and noise at idle when cold

46K views 53 replies 29 participants last post by  jarrettlaurie392 
#1 ·
Haven't seen this answered yet, but have seen it asked.....
Car shakes and is loud when first starting in the morning. Once it's warm, it's ok. Does anyone have any idea? Dang thing sounds like it's giving birth.....
 
#6 ·
Id also like to fix this problem it seems that after i drive 10 miles it goes away. and it used to only do it in the mornings now if i let it sit between 4 - 8 hours while at work when i go to crank it it goes again. I took it to my mechaninc they had no clue and look at it for 3 days. I am totally stumped at what it could be. No loss of power just that noise and now when my RPS go back to idle right under 900 it makes my steering wheel vibrate. HELP PLEASE!!!!!! cause im about to put my car in the shop for another week and get a rental car but i want a cheaper way out than that..........
 
#7 ·
Another note mine is when at idle it growls louder as the rpms get higher when i drive (mines a 5 speed) while im giving gas in Gear its silent. then when i let off the gas it starts again. you can bearly hear it from under the hood near the firewall but not for long but in the car it sounds like a loud growl.
 
#9 ·
What it is is when you start your car cold the pcm is in open loop meaning that it doesnt use sensor information for the fuel trims instead it uses learned settings it goes away once warm because the engine goes to closed loop operation and runs more efficently. Its louder and vibrates more because the engine isnt running efficently or smoothly.
 
#12 ·
If it was a motor mount, it likely would still be there if the engine was warm, but since their problem goes away when it warms up, it sounds like a PCM issue to me.
 
#15 ·
Any followups on this? I have a similar problem.
Thanks.
 
#16 ·
People,
Please remember when posting what is wrong with your car, be sure to include what Focus you drive, including the engine, transmission, mileage, any modifications you may have made, as well as any related maintenance items that were done just before the problems arose.
 
#18 ·
my car sounds like a damn diesel on cold start up... but that has to do with my setup.

solid lower mount and stg 3 cams make her sound like a diesel and shakes like hell when she is cold.. but it dont bother me :lol:

and yes maybe some audio would be a great help
 
#19 ·
I just got my Focus, a 03 ZX3, 5 Speed, 2.0l with 50,000 miles.
My car vibrated badly when cold and got better as it warmed up. The vibration would be worse when going around corners, and would momentarily go away completly when you crested a hill. The vibration was so bad it would make the rear view mirror blurry.
The problem was the passenger side motor mount. Fifteen minutes of work and $94.00 for the new mount now the car is so quiet you can not hear or feel the engine running if the heater fan in on.
To diagnose the problem , I took out the old motor mount to check it. It wasn't leaking or cracked, matter of fact it looked pefectly fine. I put the mount in a vise and compressed it to see what would happen. It would compress about .2" then become solid. So I put the mount back on the car and measured it with the engine weight on it. With the weight of the engine it compressed .2", so there was where the vibration was coming from the mount was collapsed. So I ordered a new one from Ford.

You can see in this picture the new mount is taller.


It's taller by almost 3/10's of an inch, or .296" to be exact.

 
#22 ·
Young... nice, I always wanted to see inside one of those. That answers about 3 recently started threads.

Welcome to FJ.
 
#23 ·
OK, so I'm going to buy a new passenger side motor mount. I decided to take a look at the rear motor mount just to make sure I didn't need that too. How do you tell if the rear mount is bad? The "dog bone" looks fine. The bushing on the small end looks like it's not a complete circle. It looks like the circumference is missing except for a section about half an inch long at the far end. I can't tell if there's more bushing tucked inside and if that's how it's supposed to be. If it is indeed bad, I'm thinking of replacing them with prothane inserts. Do they pop in easily? Thanks for any advice.
 
#24 ·
SecretAgentMan2k said:
OK, so I'm going to buy a new passenger side motor mount. I decided to take a look at the rear motor mount just to make sure I didn't need that too. How do you tell if the rear mount is bad? The "dog bone" looks fine. The bushing on the small end looks like it's not a complete circle. It looks like the circumference is missing except for a section about half an inch long at the far end. I can't tell if there's more bushing tucked inside and if that's how it's supposed to be. If it is indeed bad, I'm thinking of replacing them with prothane inserts. Do they pop in easily? Thanks for any advice.
I just did the lower mount on my SVT, mine didn't look bad but I could move the motor more that .25" by hand. So I replced it with the CFM one and man what a difference that made and my car only has 51k on it.

Did any of you have this issue on acceleration? On my car I will rev to 3500 rpms in 3rd gear, hold it and if I accelerate, the floor will vibrate. If I hold the rpm or back off it goes away. I'm chasing this down on my car as I've been all over the CV's and axle support bearing and it all looks and feels good.
 
#26 ·
Dieselman959 said:
I have the same vibration when cold.....goes away once it warms up. How would a motor mount be suspect with temp?

The viscosity of the fluid when cold -vs- hot.
 
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