When I test drove my SS I immediately. Noticed it had an almost buzzing noise
To me it was loud my friend who was with me along with the salesman said they could not here it.
I finally got use to it.
Had the dealer look at it first time in they could not hear it.
When they put in my new steering column along with my vacuum motor for the brakes they found a screw missing up inside the dash somewhere.
Now it drives like new

 

Yes the lovely hhr rattles. Indeed they do have more rattles than a baby's play pen. Personally I crank down a window or like mentioned earlier I crank up the radio.

 

It's just annoying to have this many rattles on an almost new vehicle. I worked on the cargo bay and I think I made it worse. It hard to tell where the noise is coming from because you can rap almost any panel and get something. The dash up front is most annoying. It seems sharp impacts cause the problem, not big bumps. It's not a rattle per se, but a sharp creaking noise. Does not appear to be the glovebox, storage bin, top dashpad, or the faceplate panel. . It must be in the internals of the dash, just my luck. Did notice the shifter surrond was complete loose and had to put that back in place. Like I said, my old Camaro with T-tops has less.......

 

My 2011 had a sharp creak/crack in the dash because the A-Pillar trim was binding up with the top dash pad, hit a bump the right way and it would let go with a sharp CRACK!

The dealer removed the A-Pillar trim and "massaged" the dash pad a bit to remove the bind, just something you might check. Have a passenger push in on the trim pieces as you drive.

The noises in the rear can be harder to trace as you've found, but one thing to try is removing the cargo shelf and the spare tire cover/storage bin, see if that lessons the rattling any.

 

I can understand how frustrating things like this can be. My husband can hear all the rattles, cracks and things of that nature in our vehicle too. You have posted, you only have 4,000 miles on the HHR. Are you still within your Bumper To Bumper Limited warranty via time frame? If you don't know this, I would be happy to look into the warranty information if you would like to provide me with the VIN of your car.

Michelle, Chevrolet Customer Service

 

I am but I thought rattles were only covered under the 12/12?

 

The worst rattles I had were the gray plastic wheel covers. I took them off and rattle gone. I also removed the flat floor covering in the cargo area. I'm into simple.

 

Well I found the worst offender, it is the center stack or the center stack faceplate. I removed it and the sharp rattle is gone. Now I just need to figure out what part of the center stack is the culprit. At least I narrowed it down!

 

I used 1/8" black foam tape, cut to fit and lined the console pieces. Quieted right up