2018 Mazda3 - what is that mysterious ticking noise
Hello all, for the past few months my 2018 Mazda3 has been making a ticking/rattling noise from behind the steering wheel/the steering column area when at speeds above ~50mph.
I thought I had found the solution with this video: https://youtu.be/-JAWRTP7QGk. In this video, the problem is a bolt on the intermediate steering shaft that can work a bit loose (it's for a CX-50 but assuming the same thing applies to my car). So anyway, I've tightened that bolt multiple times to the correct torque (and even slightly above in the hopes that it would stay longer) but within an hour of driving the noise comes back.
Has anyone else experienced this before? If so, how did you fix it? If needed, I can try to post a video of the noise in the comments. Thanks!
Posted Aug 10, 2026, 4:22 PM UTC