jingling noise at idle

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sunfire2door

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hey everyone i have a 2001 pontiac sunfire 2 door with the 2.2 engine and at idle (in park or in gear) it makes a loud jingling noise, what could be causing the noise? the car has 196,000 kms
 
What area is the noise coming from? Is it louder in the cabin or under the hood? Did it just start out of the blue or has it been slowly getting worse?
 
did you look under the car at the exhaust system?
 
Maybe a idler pulley or belt tensioner if the noise is worse from under the hood.
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it's surely coming from under the hood, on the passenger side, and it had been slowly happening and getting worse, the noise seems to be loudest in the drive belt area.
 
also when i put the air conditioning on the noise seems to go away and when i turn it off the jingling noise comes back, also when i turn on the ac i can hear a clicking noise and all the lights all of a sudden dim (including headlights and cluster.
 
I would recommend you remove the belt and spin each pulley by hand to see which is making noise. Alternately, you can buy a mechanic's stethoscope or use a screwdriver to touch around each pulley as the engine is running to isolate the bad one. Just touch the tip of the screwdriver (the longer it is the better for safety)to the mounts of the idler pulleys or alternator, etc and put your ear to the handle. Just be very careful when you do this.
 
Bearing in the compressor going out is my guess.
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zimgxp i believe your right on that as my uncle has a 2002 sunfire (bought brand new) and over the summer we had used the air conditioning and as we pulled into the driveway and turn off the ac the car had the same jingling noise as my 2001 sunfire, so im guessing that it is the compressor bearing, because when you turn on the ac the nosie goes away.
 
take the belt off and start the car and see if you can still hear it . dont leave it run to long or the battery will die .
 
The problem is most likely within the serpentine belt path. Typically, the source of the sound you're describing generally comes from something without a load, i.e., an idler pulley or AC compressor that's de-energized. BUT, the source of the noise is not always the problem. Since the mid 90's or so, serpentine belts have been made of an improved material compared to the older ones and they rarely, if ever, crack. Unless you have something seized in it's path, you won't see signs of slippage or glazing. In all actuality, a worn belt will actually look like a really good belt. The grooves get deeper as it wears. Generally a parts store will have a free gauge (or they may charge up to a buck) to determine belt wear, if you're groove is as deep (or deeper) than the gauge, it's time for a change. I recently checked our GP and the gauge actually indicated there was some life left, but I changed them anyway (mines and SC, I have 2), and it quieted the engine to the point it almost sounded new. There is another factor that with today's idler pulleys that you can't see: belt stretch. I noticed that both new belts were almost 2 inches shorter than the old ones. One belt was the same brand, one was different, so I can't say that it was a brand change, belts stretch over time and this needs to be taken into the consideration of replacement. Since your car is a 2001, if the belts are original, you have better than 50000 miles on them, or over 5 years old, they probably need to be replace just due to the stretch.
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well the original owner changed the belt at 100,000 kms, and it now has 197,000 kms, so i'm assuming the belt needs to change, but one thing that stll stumps me is my uncle had a 2002 sunfire and the noise started after turning off the a/c, and he had changed the belt twice, so thats why i'm thinking it's something else than the belt. ac clutch maybe?
 
It's possible, the best thing to do is take the belt off and check all the pulleys in the path, it might be the clutch for the AC, it could be an idler that gets a little more tension under the load of the AC.
 
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