Exhaust rattling...any ideas why?

[Original 4th Gen V6]

I just turned over 72,000 miles on my car and my exhaust is rattling. It only does it when I am stopped and usually when the engine is cold (i.e. when I crank her up in the morning). Im thinking it is my cat converter because they tend to go bad around 60 or 70k miles. Anyone else have this problem?

[Backfire]

There are a couple of heat shields that have a tendency to shake loose and/or rust loose, resulting in a rattle. I hade to remove one near the cat a while ago because one of the joints had rusted and it was rattling. I would check those first.

[ravenp]

I had an exhaust rattle.. turned out to be a baffle inside the muffler coming loose.

Have you noticed the exhaust sounding louder? That was what tipped me off. Replaced the muffler under warranty, problem solved.

Good luck.

[goldenfbodyboy]

You also might want to check out your exhaust hangers- if they get old the exhaust sags and can hit up against the trackbar, I believe.


cheers

Golden

[Original 4th Gen V6]

Anyone else have any ideas?

[94bird]

hey 4th gen v6, how do you like the jet stage 2?
i'm thinking of getting it.
did you notice a big gain in pwr?
i think they promise something like 15-17 hp.
how does the car run when you're not getting on it..does it mess with idle speed?

[SeanC97]

I just fixed the same problem. I heard rattle at the same times that you did. I took my car back to the place where i had my muffler welded, and we found a small exhaust leak about six inches back from the cat. It was caused by a gm clamp that goes bad, or falls of, then gives a rattle. May not be the same thing, but it is worth checking out. :D

[NSolano]

i have the same problem only mine rattles when i go over 95 or so and when i stop at a light it rattles. It stops after i let it rest though, i think it's the hangers. Hope u get it fixed. by the way, what is jet stage II??

[knowledgefreak]

the double walled y-pipe has a tendency to rattle when the pipes becom seperated making one think the noise is at the cat when it is not.

[Original 4th Gen V6]

I figured it out. My cat converter has gone bad. Pieces of it are inside "jumping" around having a good time---making my car sound like crap. I have a 3 inch highflow cat on the way and a 2.75 inch I pipe to replace the stock 2.25 S bending I pipe. I hope my borla will have an even better tone and I will have some horsepower gains from the new cat and I pipe. Thanks to all that posted.