How To: Check for an interior leak

[Adam]

Ok, I had posted about a water leak in the rear seat floor board of the car. I have had 3 PM's and 8 emails between the two sites on how to check this. So far after contact back, 9 of the 11 people who asked how to check have checked and 3 people have this issue. 3 out of 9 is 33% of cars so far. Now maybe they asked because they thought they had this issue. Whatever the case may be, that number is high. Below is the quickest way to check your floor boards.

YOU MAY NOT EVEN FEEL ANY MOISTURE ON TOP OF THE CARPET BUT STILL HAVE THE ISSUE!!!

My car had no sign of this until I was running a wire under the carpet and saw it all, about 2" of standing
water.

It is pretty easy to check. The best way is to pop out your back seat bottom. It is only held in place by 2 clips in the front portion of the back seat bottom. About 6" over from the side most part of the seat on each side. Give it a few hard cranking tugs straight up near the pin and it will pop right out. REAL EASY! Then the gap from the seat bottom and the carpet with show. Feel between the metal and the carpet. See if you can wiggle your hand down to the floorboard where your feet would be in the back seat. You do this by getting your and between the metal and the 2" thick juke padding and try to run it (your hand) all the way down to the floorboard area. If it feels wet then you most likely have this issue. At that point I started pulling trim pieces off and such so that I could get a better look. You have to have the seat bottom out to get the door threshold pieces out in the back too. That is when I saw standing water after pulling the carpet back.

You could also try things like taking a long screw drive and a towel and poking it down there then feel if the towel got wet, if it is too tight for your hand/arm to fit between. I did not try that but I am sure it would work. It is best to see if you can feel the dampness under the carpet by hand. Good luck. Let me know how it turns out. Maybe you can check both sides, but I believe the air conditioner tube runs through the drivers side rear foot well.

[BigRed585Lbs]

As I did, take your shop-vac with the narrow nozzle tip on it and press it HARD into the outside corner of the driver's side rear seat footwell and see if you can suck with the shop-vac any moisture up through the carpet and padding. If you get any water in the shop-vac, believe me, you've got PLENTY under your carpet. I was able to remove at least 20 oz. from BigRed, which I presented to the service manager on my last visit.

I hope you are unable to do this.

[Panzer Leader]

Thanks, for the info. I hate to think there is water back there. Guess it doesn't rain in OZ. WTF they all come down the same production line right? Well I cannot let it piss me off because it wil only add to the possible water under the carpet.

[BigRed585Lbs]

And will REALLY stink!

[BigRed585Lbs]

Here's an idea, if you think you can't find where it's coming from:
http://www.lowes.com/pd_199310-143-K...roduct_price|1

[pokey]

LOL! I had a rubber plug which opened to below on my Jeep Wrangler. I thought it was cool, I'm not as impressed if my G8 needs one.