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I've noticed recently that my passenger seat is quite noisy. The highways I drive on for work are bumpy and uneven, and the passenger seat seems to shake a lot. It makes a constant rattling or tapping sound, and it does so at a fast pace. I can confirm that it's the seat, as when I reach over to hold it down with my arm, the noise stops. It only seems to be the backrest of the seat, not the part where you sit on it.

My car is a 2006 Toyota Corolla. Are there any tips for quieting a noisy seat?

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    When I saw the title, I thought the answer would be 'tell the passenger to be quiet'... It sounds like something is worn, so try setting the chair to a different level of recline; maybe one notch or so would do it. Or get a new one from a junk yard.
    – PeteCon
    Commented Aug 22, 2016 at 15:16
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    @Pete My first thought was "feed it", which got dark pretty quickly.
    – Jason C
    Commented Aug 22, 2016 at 15:23
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    @Pete I can look into changing the recline level on the chair. Unfortunately, telling the seat to quiet down doesn't quite work here. :)
    – nightsurfer
    Commented Aug 22, 2016 at 15:25
  • Once had a rattle noise coming from the passenger seat. Come to find out, my kids had stuffed a drink bottle and some other trash in the seat back pocket. Cleaned it out and the noise went with it.
    – CharlieRB
    Commented Aug 23, 2016 at 20:36
  • Replace the seat and track assembly.
    – Moab
    Commented Aug 26, 2016 at 21:59

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It's almost impossible to say without knowing what is rattling, so you have to find out first.

You could give it a few good shakes by hand when the car is stopped, if you can make the noise happen you should be able to narrow it down.

Then at that point it just becomes a matter of either a proper fix (tightening bolts, resetting springs, replacing worn parts) or creative problem solving (shove a rag in a gap, put some weight in the chair, change the seat position, duct tape, bungee cords, zip ties -- for example, you say it stops when you hold it down with your arm, so as a quick fix rig something up to always apply that pressure).

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  • For example: I've had a plastic clip fail on the lever for the slide mechanism. That mean the lever could drop and rattle against the rails. A slack cable tie sorted it out
    – Chris H
    Commented Aug 23, 2016 at 8:14

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