Ok so I've seen so many threads about random rattles in their cabin of the Transam's and so forth so I've been making it a mission of mine to start getting to the bottom of this and I've been eliminating stuff little by little

I came to found out one of the most annoying ones is actually my E brake lever. The handle has came loose from the actual lever and every time the cabin vibrates its rattling..

So trying to retighten it, I only found one screw on the handle and it appears to be something I'd need an Alan wrench for but out of the 2 different sets of alan wrenches I had nothing fit... Can someone tell me what to use?

 

Mine rattles like a bitch but mine is riveted on

 

Mine don't rattle but has way too much slack and thus is pointless so i never even use it.

 

Mine was riveted on... Bought a used one in great shape and switched them out!! Problem fixed

 

I drilled the rivet out when I tore my car apart.

I think I remember that there is an adjustment under the car, but I could be mixed up with another car,


On another note, when I went to put that back together,,, I cant figure it out. lol so its stilll in pieces.

 

This is the #1 thing I hate about my car/interior is that damn rattling from the E brake. I always hold it at a stoplight and depress the button b/c I just assumed it's that button rattling against some plastic but when I hold it I'm pretty sure it does stop rattling so it probably is the handle. Is every handle riveted to the lever from the factory? Can you not put something in between the handle and lever to deaden the rattle?

 

Yes now that I look at it closer it does seem to appear to be a rivet holding it together... not to be negative but what a shitty design...

 

I fixed this on my car. I got tired of the handle rattling. There were actually 2 rattles and I made the second one worse trying to fix the first rattle. I could feel the handle sliding fore and aft by about a 1/8" total and a bit of looseness which would quiet when I placed my hand on it, as several of you are describing.

DON'T do what I did first: Attempt to tighten the rivet with a hammer and a well placed center punch. The sideways force will tweak the sheet metal handle and cause rattling below the console. Anyway, the more I tried, the more I realized the rivet would not be affected by the punch.

Do this instead: Drill out the rivet. It may try to spin in its bore as it did for me, so you can try going in at an angle with a slightly smaller drill bit. Once you drill it out, you can remove the leather handle by sliding it off the end of the metal shaft. Be careful, as the button has some springy bits that may go flying. The rivet hole only goes through half of the metal handle. Using a similar size drill bit, drill the rest of the way through being careful not to let the metal shavings fall into the console. Grab yourself a screw and tap out the rivet hole to match its threads. Test fit the screw. If you try to reassemble things, you will find that the screw will bottom out against the inside of the leather handle when you try to put it all back together (don't over-tighten or you will break the leather grip). Hence, you will have to grind down the length of the screw so that it just barely clears the metal once the handle is on. You can make this easier by placing a nut on the screw before grinding to clean up the threads when you are done. Before reassembling all the bits with the button, you can test fit the handle and screw to make sure that it does not bottom out and holds the handle tight. Reassemble.

The second rattle was from the mechanism inside the console. The lever would still rattle left-to-right at stoplights. The base of the sheet metal parking brake handle wraps around a partial gear, to which it is held with rivets. In fact, everything in this mechanism is held in with rivets. Too get to it, I removed the automatic T-shift handle, center armrest door, parking brake handle, and finally the center console (be aware that there are wires attached to the back of the cigarette lighter, the PRNDL lighting, the traction control, and convertible top switches if so equipped). The problem is that the sheet metal handle, which is folded in the middle, opens up and gets loose over the gear it is actuating.

Now here is where things get dicey. Since I could not take the mechanism apart, I attempted to force the two halves of the sheet metal closer together so they would be tight again. Unfortunately, since there is an inherent springiness in the metal, one would have to bend it past the intended point to get it back to stock...which is not possible with the gear in the middle. So what did I do? BFH and a block of wood and a block of metal too. Don't even try a clamp, it won't make any difference. So long story short, I don't know which of my many blows to the mechanism tightened things up, but it rattles no more. You'll have to put everything back together to see if this has worked for you, but it certainly worked for me.