Had a creaking sound coming from the front of the car. At first I thought the front suspension was acting up, so I took the car in. The SA went for a ride with me and heard the noise. He thought it was likely something to do with the front dash and something getting loose. Not a big issue or the suspension. The creak noise only could only be heard on ocassion, seemingly once every 5 minutes during a drive and when turning into an incline or ramp. He said to bring the car back on a cold day so the noise could be more easily duplicated and located.

Brought the car back during a cold snap and sure enough BMW found the problem. There are some mounting bolts in engine compartment that needed to be re-tightened. When I returned to pick the car up the SA said there is a new service bulletin on this. So I'm passsing this along to others that might have the same issue. Its fixable.

PS. The X3 loaner sucked. SUVs suck. Taking a quick tour of the showroom, I must say the e60 sport is my favorite bimmer. Of course I'd take the 06 blue M5 I saw for its performance, but the e60 M styling isn't my bag. Although the interior is much better and the white leather looked great. Gotta love the leather on the dash and that nice center console with the SMG thingy.

Oh well, this is my techincal contribution to forum for 08 Enjoy.

 

I have a little rattle or chirping sound too.. it's not all the time but only on occasion like when hitting a bumpy road... Sounds like it's around the driver's side dashboard area. Is this what you experienced?

 

I have a 'chirping' sound too and have traced it to the instrument binnacle. I haven't had a go at fixing it yet but there does appear to be a couple of screws that hold a piece of trim in place. Squeezing the binnacle cowl does stop the noise though.

 

No. Not the fix in my case. This sound seemed to come from the center dash.

Yes I have this, which is something else. I suspect its the left binacle stalk and the sliding plastic switches getting loose. Nothing really can be done (or that BMW will fix) with that. I asked them about that.

 

Had a creak coming from the front of my car when I went over speed bumps. Took in to the shop and they replaced my front sway bar bushings. Creak is gone .

 

I too have a similar creak in my dash, however I drive an 06 330i. I plan to take my car and ask them to check my struts too. Here's a link to the service bulletin:

http://www.bmwtis.com/tsb/bulletins/bullet...mp/B511304g.htm

 

Oh good... easy fix myself... I'll archive this in the back of my brain

 

My car was at the dealer because of a noise from the passenger side of the dash when going over rough road and a creak from the rear suspension whenever I exited the car. They found the dash sound was caused by the spare fob that goes in the glove compartment. Apparently the weight of the spare fob was was causing the back of the glove compartment to move. I found this hard to believe but the sound is gone now that the spare fob was removed. The rear suspension noise is from the hand brake. It turns out that if you get out of the car with the handbrake set, there is some rubbing. I tested this and sure enough, there is a creak with handbrake on and no sound with it off.

 

Yes i think you guys are right.. when you squeeze the binnacle cowl it does go away.. anyway to fix??

 

Since it has gotten cold my cluster rattles also in the summer I don't have this you can press on the bottom of the cluster and it moves back and forth for now I just stuck a quarter under it and all is fine. When I have time I am going to get some velcro and remove the cluster and place the velcro there, this is not as annoying as the darn rear noise sounds like two plastic ballons rubbing together