I have searched all the water leak threads and I cannot find a pinpoint straight forward answer.

I live in Florida and the recent tropical storm Fay brought a gallon of water into my parked car overnight. This has happend before in regular rain but the big storm brought alot of water. I removed the cowel cover and resealed around the edges where the foam gasket rotted away (4 weeks ago). I used the homedepot weather stripping and bought all new plastic clips from Acura $40.00. The car ONLY leaks when it is parked on a 10-15 degree slope. It will not leak at all if parked backwards up hill or on a flat surface. Doesnt leak when im driving in the rain either. Unfortunatly I havent had the opportunity to lay upside down on the passenger floor while someone sprayed water on the car while parked on the driveway.

Where is the water coming from? Pictures of where the water is coming from would be great! Any detailed pics of this area or where the freakin stupid cabin HOLE is whould be great too.

Facts:
AC drain is not clogged.
Sunroof Tube is not cloged and drains fine.
The OEM Rubber gromet and hose for the wires from the cabin to the door are perfect and not cracked.
Cowel is sealed properly.
Door and window seals are perfectly fine.
Water is definatly coming from the passenger floor area. Maybe behind the ECU somewhere up there.

 

OK I found where the leak is ending but not sure where its starting.

It rained the other day so I Parked the car on the driveway, so it was sitting on an incline of 10-15 degrees. I removed the kick plate and pulled back the carpet. Water starting pooling up and flowing down towards the back seat.

It is coming from behind the ecu directly in the middle of the ecu. The ECU does not get wet nor do any of the wires. I would have to remove the ECU to see where its coming from. I will do that this weekend.

Does anyone know where it is originating from? Is there some kind of cabin hole up or around there?

 

Sounds EXACTLY like the leak I've been dealing with for nearly 4 years now. Just like you said, it's only when the front end of the car is pointing uphill.

Here's what I have figured out. If you remove your cowl trim and the passenger side fender, you'll see how the water is supposed to drain. It's supposed to drain out from under the cowl trim here:



From there it's supposed to drain down behind the piece of frame rail underneath the fender, and down to the ground. This pic shows where it's supposed to drain out from behind the frame rail (upper arrow) and also shows the sunroof drain tube (lower arrow):



This pic with the arrow shows that piece of the frame rail with the fender removed (not my car):



I found water coming down behind my ECU and pooling in the floorboard, shown here:



My ECU bracket looked like this



So back around the winter of '04/'05 I removed my dashboard to try to fix the leak. To my delight I found a hole in the seam sealer up under the dash, above the blower motor (red arrow in this pic), which I figured would be an easy fix:



Here's the hole, with the blower intake duct just to the right:



I poured water down the windshield, and indeed saw water coming in through that hole. I sealed up the hole with silicone, then added JB Weld, then added MORE silicone.

But then I tried again, and found water STILL coming in, this time through the hole above the ECU where the door harness passes through. If you remove you fender and look, you'll see the large rubber grommet for the door harness attaches to a hole in a piece of metal, but then there's ANOTHER piece of metal inside the car, with another hole, where the wires pass through to the inside. It's like a hollow area where the door hinges bolt on.

The problem is that there is NO way to get to that hollow piece of metal to see where the water is coming in unless you drill out spot welds and remove the piece of frame rail shown in the pic above.

Here's a pic of that other car (not mine) with that piece of frame rail removed. You can see the V-shaped channel near the end of the arrow, which is where the water drains out from under the cowl trim. Somewhere in that area where the arrow points, water is getting inside that hollow area where you see the door hinges bolted on (door harness grommet is right below the upper door hinge):



But since I don't have a welder nor do I know how to weld, I've never done anything with it. I actually tried about a year ago to inject some expanding foam up into that hollow area, through the hole where the door harness grommet attaches, but that still didn't work.

So for nearly 4 years I just keep a couple of towels laid flat underneath the carpet, and change them out every couple of weeks, or more often during times when we get lots of rain. It keeps everything from getting soaked, and you can't really tell that anything is under the carpet.

One of these days I hope to have someone with a portable welder come over to my house so we can get this thing fixed up. I can't really take it anywhere because I can't be without my car during the week.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by PatrickGSR94 &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">Sounds EXACTLY like the leak I've been dealing with for nearly 4 years now. Just like you said, it's only when the front end of the car is pointing uphill.</TD></TR></TABLE>

That leak, can it also happen on the driver's side? I assume it would be the same type of Drain.

 

Thanks for the detailed post Patrick. I wish everyone would post like you do. You understand how important it is to be detailed and specific. Unlike people who simply say "check your drain tube"

I did find your post in the searches but I didnt think all that water was coming in thru a little cracked seam sealant. I might check out a junkyard this weekend, that has the dash removed and get a better look in there. Ill take pics and finally get to the absolute bottom of this. I might drill a hole right where the water pools. That way it leaks in and flows right back out at the same time.

 

eh I don't care to put any holes from the outside directly into the interior cabin. Could be a way for carbon monoxide exhaust gases or other things to get in.

Also, when I was checking my leak, all it took was a little water down the windshield to get a steady stream or at least a steady series of drips to come in the car. So imagine a big rainstorm and all the water that gets into that "gutter" below the cowl trim and runs down the side of the car. It can fill it up quick.

 

What I dont understand is how you filled the seam hole with silicon and JB weld, and still have a leak. Does that not deduce down to the seam hole as not the source of the leak?

What do you think would happen if that hole was filled and sealed so water could not flow in from under the cowel, but instead drilled the front of that area in front of the battery for the water to drain out? Maybe fill that whole fender support with foam.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Sweetsystem &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">What I dont understand is how you filled the seam hole with silicon and JB weld, and still have a leak. Does that not deduce down to the seam hole as not the source of the leak?

What do you think would happen if that hole was filled and sealed so water could not flow in from under the cowel, but instead drilled the front of that area in front of the battery for the water to drain out? Maybe fill that whole fender support with foam. </TD></TR></TABLE>

Originally it was coming in the whole that I filled. But then after I filled it, I found the water dripping from the hole in the side where the door wire harness comes through.

I tried doing spray foam, but there's just no way to get up there far enough. Removing and re-welding that frame rail I showed above is going to be the only way to get to the area where the water is coming in.

 

I see. So the ultimate without a doubt solution would be to remove the frame rail and seal this seam or hole from the outside.

Damm

 

anybody know were to get the cowel clips cheap

 

parts.com