Besides the flattened plastic grommets, there are a couple other things that will create a rattle. I had a rattle from day one on my chopped tour pak that came from the passenger backrest. The upper section has two "knobs" molded into the plastic that sit on the T-P lid. With no passenger, the upper section vibrates against the lid and creates all kinds of racket. I glued two 1/8" thick rubber blocks onto the lid for the "knobs" to ride against, to reduce the noise and to protect the paint. It's been working for two years so far.
The next issue is related to the side play between the metal bracket and the plastic grommets. If you look closely, you will probably find a visible gap between the metal bracket and the sides of at least one of the grommets. Depending on how the entire bracket fits to the four grommets, this can result in a pretty good buzz at certain rpm. Try spreading the bracket slightly to force it against one side or the other of the grommet, or do what I did on a quick detach sissy bar years ago and bond some thin shim stock to the inboard (hidden) side of the bracket to take up the slack. The side play is one of those "damned if you do, damned if you don't" things. If the fit of the bracket to the grommets is too tight, aligning and installing the item becomes difficult. If it's too loose, you get movement and rattles. I have a suggestion for the MoCo to help alleviate this problem: Make the grommets with a taper on each side, so the opening is slightly wider at the outer edge and tighter at the bottom. Easier to get the bracket started into the wider opening, but a progressively tighter fit as you rotate the latches and force the bracket to seat into the grommet. Oh, and use a better material that doesn't flatten out so easily.
Jerry
Author
Topic: Detachable tour pack rattles (Read 8558 times)