Rear doors leaking
Posted: Wed Jun 06, 2012 9:27 am
Noticed with all the rain we've been having that the rear carpets were getting wet, so I thought that I would check out a few things, door seals seemed ok, so checked the shut lines to make sure the seals were actually being compressed and doing their job, slight adj made to the catches on both doors as the doors were not perfectly flush with the rear panels, ( just being picky I suppose ), and hoping for a quick fix.
Needless to say this didn't fix the problem, so next was to remove the door cards and speakers and check the membrane, these appeared to be ok, but in a couple of places they had just come away a little from the adhesive, so I pressed them back in and stuck a little duct tape over them to make sure they stayed there.
Checked the drain holes a the bottom of the doors, ok. Now starting to get baffled, so I thought the only thing to do was to pour some water down the outside of the windows and see what happened, needless to say this showed up a few possible faults, water found its way out of a couple of the holes where the clips for the door card go, and more so, out of where the speaker goes.
If you've ever had the card off you will probably know that the clips and speaker have a very thin gasket on the rear of them, I suppose to seal them against any water ingress, but it would seem that one of these is not doing its job, so I removed a couple of clips from the door card and fitted them back into the door panel, then I poured more water down the window, this time the only place it came out was through the speaker aperture, thus showing me that the clips gasket was doing its job.
So I decided to refit the speaker using a thin bead of sealant around the gasket, nothing too major in case I need to remove at some time in the future, but enough to do its intended job, I then refitted the panel, making sure that all clips were secure.
Retested with trusted jug of water and all seemed ok, then waited for more rain, must add that I only did one door, just to see if it was what I suspected.
Well, guess what, it worked, after the most recent rain, and we've had a fair bit, the one side was bone dry, but the side that I had left showed signs of water ingress, so I did exactly the same to that side and so far all is well, but as I type it's absolutely hammering down,so it's getting a real test.
Hope I haven't bored anyone. :blink:
Needless to say this didn't fix the problem, so next was to remove the door cards and speakers and check the membrane, these appeared to be ok, but in a couple of places they had just come away a little from the adhesive, so I pressed them back in and stuck a little duct tape over them to make sure they stayed there.
Checked the drain holes a the bottom of the doors, ok. Now starting to get baffled, so I thought the only thing to do was to pour some water down the outside of the windows and see what happened, needless to say this showed up a few possible faults, water found its way out of a couple of the holes where the clips for the door card go, and more so, out of where the speaker goes.
If you've ever had the card off you will probably know that the clips and speaker have a very thin gasket on the rear of them, I suppose to seal them against any water ingress, but it would seem that one of these is not doing its job, so I removed a couple of clips from the door card and fitted them back into the door panel, then I poured more water down the window, this time the only place it came out was through the speaker aperture, thus showing me that the clips gasket was doing its job.
So I decided to refit the speaker using a thin bead of sealant around the gasket, nothing too major in case I need to remove at some time in the future, but enough to do its intended job, I then refitted the panel, making sure that all clips were secure.
Retested with trusted jug of water and all seemed ok, then waited for more rain, must add that I only did one door, just to see if it was what I suspected.
Well, guess what, it worked, after the most recent rain, and we've had a fair bit, the one side was bone dry, but the side that I had left showed signs of water ingress, so I did exactly the same to that side and so far all is well, but as I type it's absolutely hammering down,so it's getting a real test.
Hope I haven't bored anyone. :blink:
