Unbearable Squeal/Whistle from Sunroof Area

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BeastCX5

Member
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17 CX-5 GT AWD
Hey all! Long time visitor, first time poster. I have a 17 GT with about 3k miles and all of the sudden the sunroof area has started making a deafening whistle/squeal/hissing sound at highway speeds. I find its worst when the sunroof is closed. Ive looked everywhere around the roof and sunroof area and have no idea why this has started. I even put painters tape all around the exterior of the sunroof to see if it was a bad seal?

Ill upload a video shortly.

Waiting to get an appointment at my Mazda dealer, no one in town can get me in with a rental/loaner car at the moment. Ill update as to what it is.

Any thoughts? Thanks all!
 
I had an issue with noise coming from the sunroof area. I don't think it was a squeal or whistle like sound though. It turned out to be that I had not completely closed the sunroof cover.
 
Previous owners have noticed tape on the area of the front roof rack mounts silenced the noise.

If I recall correctly, it was specifically the area of the roof rack to the body and the most forward facing part of the mounts.
 
Do you have roof racks with the crossbars installed? If the crossbars are not completely covered with the plastic insert it will whistle like blowing across a soda pop bottle.
 
I had a 1992 Mitsubishi with plastic inserts in the crossbars and the noise was tracked to a small gap where the insert did not cover the track. A new and better fitting insert did the trick.
 
roofrail.JPG

I had a similar whistling noise, turns out it was a defective roof rail that was replaced by the dealer.

A simple test - put some painting tape on the part that joins the head and body of the roof rail (there's a small gap). Turned out my passenger roof rail was making that noise and was silenced by the tape.
 
Simple and cost effective test - remove roof rails & cross bar, take it for a drive and see if the noise is still there
 
Xeler8ing said:
Simple and cost effective test - remove roof rails & cross bar, take it for a drive and see if the noise is still there
Click to expand...

Be careful though because that's what my dealer did at first. The noise was gone so they said "well, it's normal noise from the roof rail due to aerodynamics". I insisted that it wasn't normal and took out a brand new cx-5 w/roof rails on the lot for a drive, which not surprisingly didn't make any noise. That was enough evidence for them to start a warranty claim. It wasn't until I came home and got really curious that I started applying tapes to the roof rail to isolate the noise.
 
yzhng117 said:
Be careful though because that's what my dealer did at first. The noise was gone so they said "well, it's normal noise from the roof rail due to aerodynamics". I insisted that it wasn't normal and took out a brand new cx-5 w/roof rails on the lot for a drive, which not surprisingly didn't make any noise. That was enough evidence for them to start a warranty claim. It wasn't until I came home and got really curious that I started applying tapes to the roof rail to isolate the noise.
Click to expand...

So the roof rail was the cause of your issue (uhm)
 
Roof rails can cause these issues. I had roof rails on my 2016 but then I decided to NOT get them on the 2017. I never used them and they caused aerodynamic & noise issues.

Unless you are going to use the rails, don't get them installed.
 
Other option is to just slide the cross bars all the way to the rear when not in use. If that doesn’t work take them off and leave the side rails. Option 2 fixed mine.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
BeastCX5 said:
Hey all! Long time visitor, first time poster. I have a 17 GT with about 3k miles and all of the sudden the sunroof area has started making a deafening whistle/squeal/hissing sound at highway speeds. I find it’s worst when the sunroof is closed. I’ve looked everywhere around the roof and sunroof area and have no idea why this has started. I even put painters tape all around the exterior of the sunroof to see if it was a bad seal?

I’ll upload a video shortly.

Waiting to get an appointment at my Mazda dealer, no one in town can get me in with a rental/loaner car at the moment. I’ll update as to what it is.

Any thoughts? Thanks all!
Click to expand...

My Jeep made noise at first. I adjusted the sunroof. This should be an owner-doable thing, but it should also be a dealership thing on such a new vehicle...I'd take it in and tell the dealer.
 
I have a whistle in my new CX-5 as well. It starts a bit above 30MPH and increases in pitch up to highway speeds.

Did some poking around and it's the right roof rail.

If I put tape between the window and rail, the whistling goes away completely.

I looked again tonight and noticed that there's a decent size gap between the rail cap and the rail itself on the right side. It tapers from the outside to the in (wider at the outside, narrow on the inside). I believe that is the likely cause of the whistle.

I'll take it to the dealer next week to get it fixed, replaced, or removed completely. I didn't actually want rails but the trim and color I wanted had the rails and I just had them charge me less for the upgrade.

EDIT: Sure enough, a single piece of tape covering the gap between the cap and rail makes the sound go away.

uJrgLwE.jpg
 
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Those caps just snap in place. I lost one because my incompetent dealer didn’t install them correctly. I ordered OEM new ones online and seated them correctly. I understand your car is new, but a good push will save you a dealer trip.
 
All of the local dealers tried to sell me a car rails, implying that's all they had because I hadn't asked for them. I had to do an inventory search to show them VIN numbers of cars that didn't have them. They must be high margin, or popular. They also all had the rear bumper guard (I don't like the look) and wheel locks. I didn't want any of that stuff, and definitely wasn't going to pay for it.
 
Heritage07 said:
Those caps just snap in place. I lost one because my incompetent dealer didnt install them correctly. I ordered OEM new ones online and seated them correctly. I understand your car is new, but a good push will save you a dealer trip.
Click to expand...

Is there an easy way to pop the end cap off? I tried pushing it toward the rail to close the gap with no luck. Didn't want to try to pry it off and actually break anything. Thanks!
 
After I get the rail cap issue addressed by Mazda, I think I'm just going to try to eBay my roof rails and slap the roof molding trim in there (have some on order now). I really don't need the rails for anything.
 
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