Water Leaking Into Passenger Footwell

[stpas]

I have a Corolla 2000 model and when it rains, water leaks into the passenger footwell. The water runs down the inside of the bulkhead but after hours of investigation i cant find where it is coming in. I initially thought it might be coming in through a bad seal at the side corner of the windscreen as my tests with a watering can showed that the wiper channels water into that corner and the seal did seem a bit loose. To test this theory i sealed that side of the windscreen with silicone sealant (yes a bit unsightly and unprofessional but better than a rotting footwell and i can remove it later). Unfortunately despite the new seal, water still comes in as much as ever so it cant be the windscreen seal. It must be coming in somewhere later in the drainage channels, but to investigate this i think the side wing needs to be removed (which i dont dare do). Would appreciate any advice or shared experience. Cheers

[GT4 BOOSTER]

water dont always enter where it lands .check the rubber grommets on the back of the bulkhead.even better is get a torch and strip as much of the motor away so you can locate where its entering the motor.

[nickw]

Try putting loads of talc powder in the area. That way you should see a soggy trail to where the leak is comming from

Nick

[corollags]

Also, does the water come in when the heater is on faster?

we had a problem with a Renault where water was running in through the heater matrix and then into the footwells.

JUst a thought!

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[GT4 BOOSTER]

if the matix was burst it would leak all the time , and the car would reek of stale anti freeze.one way to eliminate this would be to join the 2 incomming pipes together using a length of metal pipe and 2 jubilee clips.

[stpas]

Thanks for all the replies. It happens when parked on a rainy day. I think it was on Tuesday 19th Oct when it rained all day here in Leeds. When i went to my car after work it had 1" of water in the footwell! I had to open the rubber plug to drain the worst of it away.

[deekay140]

does the car have a moonroof???

[stpas]

Im not sure what a moon roof is but it has no sort of sunroof

[GT4 BOOSTER]

could be a door seal or where the bolts if any hold the boor hinges on.possibly a bulk head grommet fell out.

[Blackbird]

My sister's got the exact same problem.

The last two days here, the rain has been absolutely chucking it down. The car hasn't been used much and lo and behold, there was easy an inch of water in the passenger footwell. And she still can't work out where it's coming from.

The sloping bit of the footwell from the bulkhead is bone dry. Where the carpet goes up at the sills is also dry, it just seems to be right smack bang in the middle of the footwell.

Her Corolla does have a sunroof and she's wondering if it could be the sunroof drainage channel. She checked the pipe from it and it's not burst or leaking, but does anybody know where it's meant to end up? I'd have thought it should go outside the car somewhere through a grommet - like the tailgate channels do, but it just seems to sit inside between the exterior and interior skin. Does that sound like it's meant to do that? I'm guessing that this is where the water is coming in though cos it seems obvious that any water coming down that pipe is gonna go inside the car.

Next problem is how to dry out the damned carpet at this time of year and in rotten weather..............

Any advice greatfully appreciated.

[mike1]

run an extention lead from nearest point to car and plug in a hairdryer, takes a couple a hours on high setting but sorts out problem.

[Blackbird]

Got a bit of an update here - and it might help "stpas".

We've discovered that the water leak in my sister's car is coming in through the airbox. Maybe your car is different to hers (hers is pretty old), but it sits at the back of the glovebox and is ducted outside. The rain is obviously running down the channel under the window wipers and getting past the seal on the duct of the airbox.

It might be worth checking. We're in the process of stripping it all out to try and seal it.