2015 CX-5 Touring makes high-pitch "dog whistle" noise after car is driven for 30 min

2015 CX-5 Touring makes high-pitch "dog whistle" noise after car is driven for 30 min

My CX-5 makes a high-pitch "dog-whistle" like noise after I have been driving around for about 30+ minutes. Once the sound starts, it does not change in pitch or volume. There appears to be no change related to an increase in speed or decrease; however, the noise will only start once the car is going faster than 30 miles per hour and will stop immediately after speed drops below 20 miles per hour. I have had several family members confirm the noise just to rule out that I was not going crazy. It is hard to tell where the noise is coming from. From the drivers seat, it appears to come from the front/right side of the car. With all windows down, it appears to be louder/coming from the right side of the car relative to the drivers seat.

I actually was not really going to do anything about this, especially since a search on the internet did not turn up anything conclusive. While there are several posts about the CX5 making noises, the characteristics of the noise from one owner to the other varies so much it is hard to see anything that would be considered a match with my own "noise issue". What scared me was a post from a 2014 CX-5 owner who was having the exact same problem, right down to the start and cut-off of the noise at certain speeds. However, he also reported a transmission leak near his rear differential too, which is not happening to me (I don't have a rear diff anyway). He discovered that there was a faulty part on his 2014 CX-5 within the transmission. It was also discovered that there was a recall on his particular CX-5 due to this malfunctioning part. While his car is a year younger, and also 4-wheel drive (mine is 2-wheel), I was shocked to see how similar our problems were and it prompted me to take the car in to the dealership to have it checked. They have not called back yet. The other issue is that I am at 32,000 miles and approaching the end of my bumper to bumper warranty. If I do nothing and this noise turns into a entire transmission replacement several months down the road, I'm screwed.

Am I doing the right thing here? It is not normal for a car to make this kind of noise, right? It makes driving the car uncomfortable if the radio is off, especially for those passengers that do not like high-pitch sounds. The service manager looked at me like i was a bit crazy when when I told him the problem, as if my noise was the new "noise-of-the-month".

Is this what you would do if you were in my shoes?

2015 CX-5 Touring makes high-pitch "dog whistle" noise after car is driven for 30 min

Quentus said:

... he also reported a transmission leak near his rear differential too
...
Is this what you would do if you were in my shoes?

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That sentence confused me. Transmission is not near the rear differential; one at front, one at rear. Are you talking about the drive shaft to the rear differential? I definitely will do the same like you if I were you. Even if the dealer can't find anything, make sure they put your complaint into their system. Hence if you ever have major problems after 5-year/60K-mile powertrain warranty expires, you have legitimate case that the problems had happened within the warranty period. Of course nobody likes high-pitched noise and I hope Mazda dealer can figure out the problem and fix it for you.

I think what I meant to say is that he had a "leak" of some sort coming from the rear differential. I threw in the "transmission" word when I should not have. I don't even remember if the leak in the rear differential was even associated with the particular part of the transmission that was found to be defective. For me, it was the fact that he had to have his whole transmission taken out and the defective part replaced costing what would be many hundreds of dollars. He was also still under warranty so he did not pay a thing. Another individual who was posting on the thread replied with the recall notice sent out by Mazda. I may have overreacted, but the similarities between his symptoms and mine were nearly identical.

I talked with the dealership about an hour ago. They have had the car since yesterday morning. They took the car for a drive on two separate trips, with the second trip being 30+ minutes and did not hear any high pitch noise! I thought for sure the service manager was pulling my leg when he told me this. In a fit of frustration, went down and got the car. I told him that I would take the car out myself and drive it until I hear the noise and then return to get one of his service techs to jump in and hear what I am hearing. Of course, I was on the road for over 50 minutes without hearing any high-pitch noise. My wife told me jokingly that they fixed the problem but didn't want to tell me what they did. I was not amused.

Reading a post by a woman who reported a similar noise in her CX-9 when the Bluetooth was in "search mode" made me start thinking about what I did not do on my trip home from the dealership that I normally do prior to hearing the noise, such as using Bluetooth. In other words, I kept the Bluetooth off. I doubt this has anything to do with it, but I am grasping now at anything that might explain why the sound never started, even after 50 minutes. I know the car was hot because it was 94 degrees out and I had the AC on. While I am trying to stay positive with my wife's joke about the dealership fixing the problem, I am sure I will hear the noise tomorrow as I am running around town. I hope I am wrong and even if I am, I am still very confused about all this.

Your idea about putting the complaint in the system is a very good idea, and I will do this just to ease my worries about this coming back and getting me later down the road financially. I also wish I had a way to contact Mazda and speak with someone who could give me actual data about whether any dealership in the US has reported this problem with another 2015 CX-5, since all dealerships send in requests for how to approach problems they have not encountered in the past. It would give me some peace of mind that my 2015 CX-5 is not the only 2015 CX-5 that is possessed by an evil spirit.

This post? My vehicle is also FWD, not AWD. Symptoms are identical, I'd say maybe Mazda didn't nail the problem after all, or maybe your trans is an older one for some reason. You need to check the serial number on it. Read the TSB. Maybe print out my post and show it to the dealer. Leak wasn't near the diff, it was the pan.
.http://www.mazdas247.com/forum/showthread.php?123848265-New-transmission-at-32k-Miles

2015 CX-5 Touring makes high-pitch "dog whistle" noise after car is driven for 30 min

Quentus, be patient. Dealer has to hear the noise from transmission to do the warranty service. Your transmission does sound like a bad bearing like madar and some other people had had. It should be covered under 5-year/60K-mile powertrain warranty so you still have time. It's unfortunate but things happen. The transmission went south on my friend's Toyota Sienna minivan at 50K+ miles and Toyota replaced the tranny for free even though it was out of the warranty.

yrwei52 said:

Quentus, be patient. Dealer has to hear the noise from transmission to do the warranty service. Your transmission does sound like a bad bearing like madar and some other people had had. It should be covered under 5-year/60K-mile powertrain warranty so you still have time. It's unfortunate but things happen. The transmission went south on my friend's Toyota Sienna minivan at 50K+ miles and Toyota replaced the tranny for free even though it was out of the warranty.

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The noise wasn't so frequent the first month, but pretty regular the second month so I knew the dealer had to hear it, but the OPs description of the problem is EXACTLY the same as mine, even the mileage is the same.

If it's at "dog-whistle" frequency, there's a possibility the people at the dealer can't hear it. Get a younger mechanic to check it out, and make sure it's one who doesn't play in a rock band.

2015 CX-5 Touring makes high-pitch "dog whistle" noise after car is driven for 30 min

Rarebit said:

If it's at "dog-whistle" frequency, there's a possibility the people at the dealer can't hear it. Get a younger mechanic to check it out, and make sure it's one who doesn't play in a rock band.

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(lol2)

So Mazda has modified configuration of the transaxle case to prevent bearing damaged in 2014 TSB but it's still happening for MY 2015? (scratch)

Thanks Madar for clarifying your post. I was going by memory since I was unable to find it when I decided to write my own. So it sounds as though the leak had nothing to do with the defective transmission part. I was connecting the two problems, but it is clear to me now that they were not related, just happened at the same time. I checked the VIN number on my CX-5 and it was not one of those in the TSB report. As a result, it is still unclear as to whether my noise is the same as Madar's with regards to a defective part. But what if they are the same - why would Mazda allow a defective part, one that they identified and recalled from 2014 to be placed in a 2015 CX-5. Isn't the point of a newer model to make sure that it does not have all the problems of the previous years model. I guess I cannot gripe about it until the shop has identified the problem.

Thanks yrwei52 for the clarification in the power-tran warranty. I thought it was 3 year/36k. This will definitely make it easier to sleep tonight. My plan is to be out driving until I hear the noise, and then quickly head down to the dealership and grab and "young" service tech to come take a ride with me. I will also provide Mader's post and the TSB with the hope that this will give them a place to start looking. Thanks for everyone's feedback.

Quentus said:

Thanks Madar for clarifying your post. I was going by memory since I was unable to find it when I decided to write my own. So it sounds as though the leak had nothing to do with the defective transmission part. I was connecting the two problems, but it is clear to me now that they were not related, just happened at the same time. I checked the VIN number on my CX-5 and it was not one of those in the TSB report. As a result, it is still unclear as to whether my noise is the same as Madar's with regards to a defective part. But what if they are the same - why would Mazda allow a defective part, one that they identified and recalled from 2014 to be placed in a 2015 CX-5. Isn't the point of a newer model to make sure that it does not have all the problems of the previous years model. I guess I cannot gripe about it until the shop has identified the problem.
Thanks yrwei52 for the clarification in the power-tran warranty. I thought it was 3 year/36k. This will definitely make it easier to sleep tonight. My plan is to be out driving until I hear the noise, and then quickly head down to the dealership and grab and "young" service tech to come take a ride with me. I will also provide Mader's post and the TSB with the hope that this will give them a place to start looking. Thanks for everyone's feedback.

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How about checking serial number of the transmission, not the VIN. Read the TSB. You may have an older trans in there for some reason. The s/n would tell you this.

This doesn't sound driveline related. This could be the ECU, the fuel pump, or any number of other things, though. Back when I had a 370Z, the ECU whine was something people complained about on the forums from time to time. I have actually heard kindof what you refer to, myself, in my 2015 CX5 2.5L AWD, a time or two, and to me it sounded electronic. Bearings typically will vary a lot with load. Accel/decel will usually tell you as they change pick from one to the other, or disappear completely.

I heard this noise again on my road-trip today.

It was coming from under the hood, with the engine off. Dunno what it is, but my initial suspicion of it being some electronic device or maybe some aspect of the fuel system remains.

My wife and I went on a trip to the mainland this week ( we live on Vancouver island) she remarked that she could hear a high pitched noise. After checking the glovebox for anything
that could be causing it, plus the passenger door storage, she tried banging the door and part of the dash without making any difference.
The noise sounded loud to me , but coming from the passenger side and it seemed to get worse as the wind outside increased.
I powered down her window, then back up and the noise was gone, it sounded like a stone in a brake rotor or similar.
On getting home I was looking at the window and at the front near the mirror there is a bit of trim, with a gap between the trim and the window, and wondered if possibly that might have been the cause, it never returned the rest of the way home, even though I tried varying the speed.
Don
By the way I did 608 Kms, probably 30 % city driving, at the end my average was 7.7 litres per 100 kms which works out to 37 MPG Imperial gal.
We have 5500 kms on car.

Brand new '16 CX-5 owner here (less than 48 hours ago!) and I'm already hearing the same whistle noise between 25-35 mph. I'm taking it to the dealer tonight but they told me that they've never heard of this issue before which seems fishy since this has been a reported recall issue. I won't jump to any conclusions yet. You all will be first to be updated.

lalilulelo said:

... which seems fishy since this has been a reported recall issue.

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A TSB is not a recall, nor does a TSB automatically apply to your vehicle. Most affect certain ranges of VIN numbers before the point where they found and fixed the problem on all subsequent cars.

Take it to the dealer and suggest that there is a TSB that may apply to it. If you give them the TSB number, even better...

Thanks for the clarification JonW. The service department confirmed that there is definitely a whistling noise coming from the car and took off the trans cover to see if there was a leak. They found nothing unusual. They have reached out to Mazda corporate and said that some regional reps are gonna take a look at it on Tues or Wed or next week (7/14-15). Hope they figure out what it is... I got a Mazda because I wanted to avoid a situation like this...

lalilulelo said:

Thanks for the clarification JonW. The service department confirmed that there is definitely a whistling noise coming from the car and took off the trans cover to see if there was a leak. They found nothing unusual. They have reached out to Mazda corporate and said that some regional reps are gonna take a look at it on Tues or Wed or next week (7/14-15). Hope they figure out what it is... I got a Mazda because I wanted to avoid a situation like this...

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So sorry to hear about your predicament. It is every new owner's nightmare to have a major issue with a new car. Likewise I am a first timer with Mazda after being with Honda for 30+ years. Would be interested to hear what is the outcome of the diagnosis with your new car.

I guess there is always manufacturing defects in any product (even reputable product). It is just horrible to experience a defect as a new owner.

limleong said:

So sorry to hear about your predicament. It is every new owner's nightmare to have a major issue with a new car. Likewise I am a first timer with Mazda after being with Honda for 30+ years. Would be interested to hear what is the outcome of the diagnosis with your new car.

I guess there is always manufacturing defects in any product (even reputable product). It is just horrible to experience a defect as a new owner.

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Agreed 100%. That is why I stopped buying new cars. If I'm going to deal with what OP is going through, I'm NOT going to take the first depreciation hit to do it, and I have had a new car that was a POS, too, OP, so I can feel your pain. Sold my 370Z with 33K miles on it because I'd just had enough BS.

lalilulelo said:

Thanks for the clarification JonW. The service department confirmed that there is definitely a whistling noise coming from the car and took off the trans cover to see if there was a leak. They found nothing unusual. They have reached out to Mazda corporate and said that some regional reps are gonna take a look at it on Tues or Wed or next week (7/14-15). Hope they figure out what it is... I got a Mazda because I wanted to avoid a situation like this...

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Anything new happen with this?