As some of you may already know, I just purchased 2 New 2011 1LT HHR's.

What I am finding out as I drive and "crateek" each one is the number of small issues that are on both cars.

Of those issues and after spending about 2-3hrs. of looking around and test driving, I finally found the solution to one that was annoying me and might be Bothering you too.

Medium to hard bumps in the road gave me an intermitent clunk from the front end somewhere and the first thoughts that came to mind were ... How can that be?
These cars are both new and have No Wear on the parts that everyone is replacing.
It must be somthing else.

After crawling around underneath and pounding, tapping, pushing, banging everthing in site, I temporarily gave up feeling defeated.
I then spent 45 minutes looking under the hood area to no avail.
In discust, I shut the hood, and at that very moment, I heard a little unusual noise.
As I probed around I accidentally noticed that when pounded/pushed down on the front of the hood after it was closed, it made a clunk sound.
Long story short, I took my flashlight and checked to see if the hood was touching anything at the bottom.
As I looked under the small gap at the bottom I noticed that the 2 rubber grommets that were there to stabilize the hood when down, were not quite touching the bottom pan.
I loosened the hood latch assembly bolts after marking it's exact position with masking tape, and dropped it approx. 1/8" to allow the hood to drop by that much and allow those rubber grommets to touch.
I then readjusted the 2 top grommets by turning the to the right 1 full turn to allow for the drop in the hood.
I then proceeded in adjusting the upper grommets to make sure the hood closed and was just touching them enough to allow support.
I put a small amount of a silicone gel lube on all the grommets.

Test drove and the clunk is COMPLETLY GONE....

The Hood on both cars was adjusted wrong from the factory.

Lets see now Chevrolet ... How much do you OWE ME ???

I am working on another little pain and will report if/when I find the problem.

SF

 

well done.

 

I adjusted my hood the first weekend I had it. I didn't like the gap spacing and fixed it. Never noticed a creek or clunk ever.

 

Body fit and finish is good for the most part, but the hood fit (gap) is to much on both of these also.
There is very limited adjustment on the gap as far as I can see as it can only be widened or narrowed from the front of the hood.
No adjustment in the hinges on mine. The only thing you can do on the hinge would be to shim it and that would widen the gap.
The fix I just did for clunk did slightly narrow the gap some.
The rear of the hood aligns with the front door seam, so that seam sets the rear measurement for the hood.

 

Same here. Adjusted mine 1st week because of a rattle noise. Problem on mine was one of the threaded grommets would not adjust up/down. The plastic threads were split/cracked. Went to the local dealer(not where I bought my car) and tried to get a new grommet. Well, lets just say it turned into a "bad dealer" story over a $4.05 part!

 

I too adjusted mine when I got it as it was not right. I have never had a cluck or noise. You may be onto something.

The HHR hood is one of the worst lined up hoods from the factory.

 

On both of mine and some of the other HHR's I have seen, it's not just about adjusting the gap.

I see that the curvature of the bottom hood lines are not an exact match to the body and it makes for a slightly wider gap near the center area.

They got it slightly wrong in the beggining and never went back to correct it.
Some are just worse then others.

SF

 

Hmm... I'll have to check that on mine.

 

If the rubber grommets (bumpers) that you are referring to are at the front on the cross member that includes the hood latch, the grommets can be adjusted up or down. They are screw type and can be rotated clockwise or counter clockwise. No tools needed, you can do it by hand.

 

Iam so lucky !!! My 2011 with 3200 or so miles on it has had zero problems or noise ! But being the person I am I know the problems a come . Thats why I bought a damn big extended waranty

I always figure a 100,000 mile waranty in the price of the car and over the yrs I am way way a head of the game .

And from all the clunks rattles and computers on these new cars I bet I win the bet again this time . Someone asked the other day about the deductibles mine is ZERO nada 0 .

Glad you found the rattle would a drove me nuts !