Odour In The Carpet

[TJSRAV4]

Hey all,

We have a 55 plate RAV 4 in the family and ever since it was purchased there has been an odour that can only be described as mouldy in the car. I had the car professionally valeted (wet vaccumed) as the dealer that it was bought from (a Toyata maindealer) were worse than useless.The offending odour was found to be coming from the fitted carpted behind the rear seats. However after being wet vacced and dried the odour was still there. I have been told by a mechcanic that this odur is caused by a re action with the materials used in the capet/sound deadning and is a reconised fault with Toyota! To be honest I would be very shocked if there is any truth in that, however I would like to rule this out before I look in to having the intire carpet taken out and replaced!

The car doesn't seem to have ever carried a pet or anything of that nature (the pre delivery valet looked like it had been done by a 5 year old so I would have been able to tell).

So if there is any thruth in the recognised fault route that would be great to know.

Many thanks in advance

[Plutus]

Never heard about it being a recognised fault but any carpet with a backing can give off an odour.

This is becasuse the backing usually has to be "cured" at some stage in the proccess and if it's not done correctly it smells.

Had this once with a new lounge carpet and had long fight to get it replaced.

Car smells can often be difficult to remove.

Spilt milk in rear once and tried everything (including wet / dry vac) - a wash with biological washing powder cured it in the end.

Good luck.

[anchorman]

I can't recall any recognised fault regarding carpets and I don't reacall it ever being discussed on this forum.

Are you sure it is from the carpet because the A/C is capable of making some very rancid smells which can be cured. Some heaters have ducts to the rear footwell so the bacteria could have formed in there. If so buy a kit and treat the heater as described but keep in mind it is very easy to access the heater inlet from the cabin filter behind the glovebox.

http://toyotaownersclub.com/forums/index.p...;hl=maintenance

See page AC26 here;

ac.pdf

[IanXT4]

A while ago I was transporting a full 10 litre water container in the boot, this leaked and I ended up with a swimming pool in the plastic boot liner.

I thought I had got away with this incident till I removed the boot liner and lifted the top carpet felt the sound insulation underneath. It was drenched.

In the end I had to lift the top carpet and pull out four 1 inch thick sound lagging pieces (one in each foot position) and dry them in an airing cupboard for a few days !!!

There was no way this would dry naturally before going mouldy as the top carpet is fairly imperious to water.

I would put money on the fact that this sound proofing has become wet in the past, was not properly removed and dried out and has and become mouldy. I would either remove it wash it in a fungicide or replace it with similar sound proofing material. There is no way you could clean/de-deodorise this thickness of material through the top carpet.

There is a complete diagram of the sound proofing on the Toyota Tech website, theoretically its shown as one piece but I found with a bit of tugging each segment under each seat is only linked in one place, cleanly tears and comes away from the rest. This means you can pull it out without taking all the seats and top carpet out. You just remove the side trims carefully lift the carpet a few inches and ease each segment out it out.

(Of course you may not be so lucky)

In my case with a bit of patience it all went back together cleanly and you would not know I had done it :-)

What caused the water (or fluid) to get down there is any ones guess, a leak in the boot, sunroof leak that's now fixed ??

Hope this helps

Ian

[TJSRAV4]

Thanks for the response!

I thought that might be the case with regards to the recognised fault route. I personally think that something has been spilt in the boot, highly likely something like milk which was never cleaned up well enough. Trouble is it is my mothers car and she has left it far to long now to get any joy out of the dealership, may well be worth trying the washing power route, how did you manage to dry it fully? Did you have to lift the carpet out?

I'm pretty sure its not the AC as the smell gets worse when the car is left sitting and in the heat (AC isnt running) and is most obviously coming from the rear carpet.

Is there any dealership employees who could price the job to replace the carpet? I pressume that means the whole carpet? I have not area what it books at hour wise.

Many thanks

[TJSRAV4]

A while ago I was transporting a full 10 litre water container in the boot, this leaked and I ended up with a swimming pool in the plastic boot liner.

I thought I had got away with this incident till I removed the boot liner and lifted the top carpet felt the sound insulation underneath. It was drenched.

In the end I had to lift the top carpet and pull out four 1 inch thick sound lagging pieces (one in each foot position) and dry them in an airing cupboard for a few days !!!

There was no way this would dry naturally before going mouldy as the top carpet is fairly imperious to water.

I would put money on the fact that this sound proofing has become wet in the past, was not properly removed and dried out and has and become mouldy. I would either remove it wash it in a fungicide or replace it with similar sound proofing material. There is no way you could clean/de-deodorise this thickness of material through the top carpet.

There is a complete diagram of the sound proofing on the Toyota Tech website, theoretically its shown as one piece but I found with a bit of tugging each segment under each seat is only linked in one place, cleanly tears and comes away from the rest. This means you can pull it out without taking all the seats and top carpet out. You just remove the side trims carefully lift the carpet a few inches and ease each segment out it out.

(Of course you may not be so lucky)

In my case with a bit of patience it all went back together cleanly and you would not know I had done it :-)

What caused the water (or fluid) to get down there is any ones guess, a leak in the boot, sunroof leak that's now fixed ??

Hope this helps

Ian

Also very interesting, thanks Ian (only saw that after I posted) may well be worth exploring that route to.

"(Of course you may not be so lucky)" That bits the worry however :D Due to the vaule of the car, may be worth getting it done at dealship level?

Dependant on cost of course

[anchorman]

Changing the carpets is a matter of removing the seats (with the Battery disconnected if you have side airbags as you might just get a smack in the teeth) and also the lower plastic trims as appropriate. It will be much cheaper to do it yourself and the carpets might be available from a "findapart.com" style breaker but be sure to check with kingo first.

Even if you haven't been using the heater you can still have the problem and believe me the smell is horrendous (like something has crawled under the seat and died) so I urge youu to at least check. You are going to be really ticked off if you go to all that trouble and expense changing carpets and underlay to find that a £7.99 bottle of A/C conditioner treatment was all that was needed.

[albert hall]

Mine stunk too, like a wet dog. Just had the aircon serviced for £89 which better do the trick.

[Bodgit-fixit-run]

On other cars I have lifted out the carpets after removing seats etc. and shampooded them with carpet cleaner and if necessary soap powder. Take care not to overwet the carpet. A Vax type cleaner works really well. Leave them in the sun and there's plenty of it at the moment to dray thoroughly. I would also do the air con. It won't do any harm and will definately clear some smells even if not the carpet.

[Plutus]

When I sorted out the spilt milk it was in another car.

Got all the boot carpets out but it had run down into cracks.

So removed and washed carpets and washed inside and allowed water to seep down a few of said cracks.

Probably not as per manual but it worked - smell did not go straight away but those little bugs ate the milk I assume.