Valuable tip for 2012 Beetle owners!

[a6m5zerosen]

If you have a 2012 Beetle and have an annoying rattle coming from the right rear of the car, here is what's up-pull the trunk mat out so you can see the spare tire. There is a silver cloth strap that holds the foam cradle full of tools into the back side of the spare wheel. Loosen the strap and remove the foam cradle, and you will see that one of the tools in the cradle (looks like a screwdriver blade without a handle) has fallen out of the cradle and is rolling around under the spare tire-that's your rattle. Stick it in the cradle on top of the black handled screwdriver-problem solved! Thanks to the guys at Larry Miller VW in Lakewood, Colorado-they've seen a lot of new Beetles with this problem.

[MNka]

Thanks for the tip!
In my case the rattle source is from the rear door - looks like those rubber supportive things were not adjusted or shrank or got harder with the cold temps (got Glücklich in December), so applying some adhesive thin foam helped. But I'll check it out with the dealer at 600 miles check.

[a6m5zerosen]

You mean the rubber blocks on either side of the rear hatch opening, above the taillights? Did the foam help the rattle? If so, how thick is the foam you used?

[MNka]

Yep, those blocks. We used Thermal Insulation Tape for Pipes, it looks like roll of adhesive thin foam, it is approximately 1/8" thick, so applied it to top and bottom rubber blocks, and it almost removed the rattle, maybe need to add one-two more layers of find thicker tape and apply it only to the bottom blocks.

[MNka]

As the weather got colder here, those foam patches became all squeezed and I can hear the noise again, so removed the foam, used small pieces of window seal - it worked!

[MNka]

And some more to this - at the dealer for the 3-months check-up they adjusted the rubber blocks and rear latch, now have no noise at all, without extra foam pads. But now it is also records warm for March in Minnesota, so need a cold day to be completely sure.