Loose Left Rear Fender

B

bluestreakrem

Member
Car
FX35
Running down the freeway I can hear a rattling clanking sound coming from the rear of the car.

When I got home I found the lower portion of the left rear fender is loose! If I bang on the fender I can hear the clanking sound inside the fender. It appears a mounting bracket must have come lose and it is dangling inside the fender and rattling around.
Anyone hear of this before? I have 52K miles on my 2009 FX35 at this point.

I'm wondering how I can get in there to the bracket.
 
The plastic trim? Can't be tge quarter panel itself since that's not bolted on. Do you have a pic?
 
No pics because there's nothing to see. The outside skin of the car looks normal. The fender is in it's correct postion and has not moved.
If I grab the lower portion of the fender where the fender flare is attached, I can easily pull it away from the car, out to the side about 1-2 inches. The left side definitly moves a bunch relative to the right rear fender which moves some but not as much as the left side.
I'll take a look at getting in there this weekend to find what's come loose.
 
Last edited:
I finally got under the car to see what's going on.

The lower portion of both rear fenders and the body cowling panel that makes up the lower portion of the body at the rear of the car (just below the bumper) are all plastic and are held in place at the rear with three plastic push pins into three brackets. These pins have come loose and fallen out. I hate those god d@m things! With the pins missing, the lower plastic body cowling is free to flap in the wind and bang against the three mounting brackets. The lack of mounting support at the rear of the cowling also allows the lower portion of the side fenders to move quite a bit. One pin attaches the cowling to each of the three brackets. Air turbulance flowing under the car is intermittantly catching this cowling and pulling it down and to the rear, away from the car and banging around. That's the noise I'm hearing and it's frequency increases as car speed increases. When these pins are missing, the lack of latteral support also allows the lower portion of the rear side fenders to be moved side to side by hand. That's why I thought there was a loose fender bracket behind the fender.

It's really a shame how flimsy a $50K car is put together these days. :at-wits-end:

I'm off to the auto parts to buy some nuts and bolts to hold things in place. :good:
 
Last edited:
Nuts and bolts? Are you going to drill holes in your FX? Buy some 3M double sided trim tape and call it a day.

• •
 
My "$58K" car is put together just fine. No one on here has has this issue and your the first ive seen with this issue.

The logic that I paid this X amount of money for this car makes no sense considering the fact that every car made today uses push pins and clips to hold things together. That is unless you buy a $300K Rolls Royce where everything is just bolts. Price never justifies problem free considering Ferrari's and Lambos rattle like crazy and cost 4 times the amount of our FX
 
Last edited:
Just buy the push pins from the dealer or somewhere online, they're very cheap. Nuts and bolts don't work well in this application. It's going to be very hard to hold the nut in place behind the plastic.

FWIW, my Lexus had the same plastic push nuts and so does my BMW in some areas. Although the BMW does use a lot more screws and threaded backing plates versus push nuts.
 
Infiniti push pins in other locations on this car have fallen out as well. That's why I'm not going back with those fasteners. So far..........Infiniti push pins didn't hold on the lower engine compartment cover or the rear body panel. I replaced the engine cover pins once and they fell out again. The rear body panel and brackets already have holes for the 5/16" pins and they are easily accessiable from the back side, so I'm using a fastener that will stay put.

Push pins of this type do work for other manufactures........when they are designed right. Yamahas pin design works great. Been over 170mph numerous times and thier pins on the body panels haven't come out yet. In my experience with Honda motorcycles.............some of their pins don't hold well either. You just have to find a design that will stay engauged for the particular application so it doesn't pop out.
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top