About a month ago I started hearing chirping coming from the front right side of the car. Almost sounds like it's coming from the engine bay. It would come and go. Now it's like constant at any speed. It sound like a nest of baby birds lives in my car.

It's a chirping squeaking sound. It has nothing to do with wheel speed and the suspension is quiet if I just move it up and down with a floor jack

Things I have tried:
1. Greased up the brakes (ebc red with brembo rotors) All the clips and the backs of the pads. This seemed to help for a bit then it came back. I did not grease the pins.
2. Took down the whole sway bar (hotchkis, about 6 weeks old with new acdelco links) and greaseD up EVERYTHING with silicon grease. I heard nothing until I took an hour drive today then I heard it again like I hadnt changed a thing.
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Things I am considering trying:
1. Shimming the brakes
2. Greasing the pins
3. Crushing the car into a small cube and selling for scrap
4. Taking my own life
5. Therapy


Any ideas?
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Oh and if I hit the brakes really hard it gets significantly louder and more frequent. I hit them real hard the other day and it chirped loudly the rest of the way home

 

I had the same problem last summer, I took apart the entire front right suspension and greased everything but the sound still persisted. After much jumping up and down on the car to reproduce the squeak I finally found it, for me it was the top of the coil over . I took it apart and cleaned/greased it but the squeak would come back in a day or two. I finally ended up just replacing the whole coil over and squeak never came back.

 

Well that's one of my issues is I can't reproduce the sound just by moving the suspension. The suspension is silent. Did you like literally jump up and down on the strut tower?

 

Sure did! I parked the car with the hood removed next to a wall so my buddy could brace himself against the wall while jumping up and down on top of the strut tower. That way I could poke my head all around that corner of the car to find the source of the sound. We had the wheel removed with the suspension resting on a stack of 2X8s so that the suspension was loaded with the cars weight and would move just like it would with the wheel in place. Not having the wheel on made it easy to determine the sound wasn’t coming from the lower bits of the suspension

 

Is it constant like a squeaky belt, or on and off like hitting bumps in the road?

 

Check the upper shock mount.

 

Can you get a video?
To assess better:
Is the sound rhythmic?
Does it do it while stopped or only moving?

 

If you suspect brakes inspect the rear/non contact side of pads. They should be shimmed and anti-squeal compound coated. Also the leading edge should have a bevel or taper.

 

It is not constant. It is intermittent. My first thought was a hose rubbing against a belt when I hit bumps but that doesn't seem to be the case. I was going down the highway and it was making no sound. Then I hit a different type of tarmac and it started squeaking. Then it went back to the other kind of tarmac, no squeaks again. It's that subtle.

 

Idk how I would get a video. It is not rhythmic. It is 100% random. It won't do it while stopped. It only does it when moving. It will not do it with the brakes pressed hard but will with the brakes very gently pressed.

 

Brake pads do have built in shims it seems. They do have a slant on either end. I looked on ebc's website and even they admit to having squeaks with their pads. They blame it on the rotors though. But my rotors have only 4k miles and they are brembo and smooth as glass still.

 

by the way, glad I'm not the only one here with a dark sense of humor lol

 

Ok yeah I did remember you saying the brakes were new. When you changed the brakes how were the calipers, did they move freely?
If you haven't changed the front hubs/bearings yet I would probably look at those just to make sure.
I once had an issue with a really annoying noise coming from my right rear brakes, replaced rotors and pads/hardware and it was still there but more intermittent. It's now gone after switching to the 06+ stuff so most likely I'd say it was the caliper binding up slightly.

 

The brakes are in the best shape of any car I've owned. This is a Florida car and I'm in Chicago. My Chrysler town&country has a binding brake caliper. It doesn't make any noise unless you are turning. What I'm saying is I know the signs of a binding caliper and this isn't it. There would be grooves in the rotor. It would at least be a slightly darker color but it isn't.

One thing that concerns me is the pad seems to go ALL THE WAY to the edge of the rotor. There's no little lip on the outside of rotor that is not touched. First time I have ever seen it. Could the pad be hanging over the end of the rotor? 07 rotors are 320 mm and I checked my original order. I got the right rotors.

Does anyone else have EBC red stuff pads on the larger, later production 350Zs?

I also, I sent a message to EBC Brakes. I'll let you guys know what they say when they respond.

 

Here is a pic of the rotor showing the pad goes all the way to the edge.

 

Gotcha I thought you had actual Brembos as in the stock ones, I wasn't saying like its stuck binding, more like not moving completely freely. I got the same brakes, I'll take a pic in a bit.

 

Here's some pics so you can compare

 

Thanks for the pics. Those look just like mine do.


UPDATE UPDATE UPDATE: I was dead set thinking it was the brakes but since dude said he had the same problem and it was the shocks I decided to jump on mine like he did his. I HEARD THE SQUEAK. Came right from where I thought it was. So I figure, Allright let tighten down what I can see right now. I could see those two nuts on top of the shock tower. I looked up the torque specs and it said 40-47. I remember I only torqued them down to like 23 or something similar because that's what I think I was told. Anywhozlebee, torque em down right and wallah. Squeak was GONE. still haven't driven her as I have some things to do this morning but will get back st ya'll when I do.

 

Upper shock mount movng around. Whoda thunkit? 😆