Water getting inside 70 series...

[PJHunter]

Hi again, yet another frustrating issue with my vehicle... this time about water getting in my car. After it having been at the panel beaters for the last 3 weeks to have a new sill and rear passenger side 1/4 panel put on i was told it was water tight... or so they thought.

The issue has been that water has been collecting between the outer steel skin and the inner interior panel within the white box in the photo below.

Originally we thought it might be because of the seals of the outer vents in the rear panel. Those turned out to be water tight.

Then we thought it would be the seals of the actuall rear windows and potentially the original welded seals of the outer and inner skin. It turned out that the window seals were absolutely fine and the original skins were as neat and clean as they would've been when they left the factory.

Then we thought of the sunroof and the water pipes. So we put a hose on the end of the pipes by the sunroof and turned the water on. 100% water tight. Not an issue.

But.... it rained last night. Hard. I went to have a look in the car and the best part of 3 inches of water had collected within that white box i've drawn. I checked the inner skin of the outside panel and it was completely dry.

So..... where can this water be getting in from? Arghhhh I'm finding this issue extremely difficult to solve. I'm sure Mr. Toyota made these vehicles to keep the rain out!

Any thoughts please would be greatly appreciated.

 

[roscoFJ73]

Mine leaked through that vent after the seal was installed incorrectly.
My memory says the seal can look to be installed correctly but isnt neccessarily so.
This happened after some minor panel work.

 

[denis]

With that amount of water I would bet on the roof/ raingutter.

Maybe it use to do this before, and you didn't notice ? Or maybe they shut the drain holes closed ?

 

[crushers]

or the slider window is rusted below the glass as well as the reciever metal underneath???

 

[PJHunter]

I think i've just seen a miracle....

... it began bucketin' outside so I went and sat in the car to watch where the water was coming in from. And guess what? It wasn't leaking at all in any of the normal areas or suggestions above. The internal panel was absolutely bone dry. But what I saw amazed me...


... the water just seemed to be absorbed from the very bottom of the panel upwards! So I stuck my head as far as i could in the side panel to see what i could see where the rear lights come into the car and... nothing. But it appears that there must be some type of sheet metal under the floor pan [but above the fuel tank] that folds in behind the outer bodyshell that is itself foled behind the rear lights. And even though visually it's tighter than a natt's a*se the water is just magically flowing into the rear panel from rear The only way to describe is to imagine yourself watching a rock and for that rock to leak water.

So I think the only way to solve this issue is to take the rear lights out, rear bumper off, fuel tank out and have the rear of the body absolutely bare so the bodyshop can do whatever they have to do to seal all the rear seams in the bodywork. What a bl**dy nuisance!

 

[crushers]

ummm and make sure the drain holes are opened up. water in water out. there is at least one on each rear quarter...

 

[PJHunter]

ummm and make sure the drain holes are opened up. water in water out. there is at least one on each rear quarter...

where exactly are these. I did look for some as i thought there were mean't to be drain holes but couldn't find any. Running my fingers along the bottom of the panel it all appeared to be solid steel.

 

[crushers]

did the unit have bodywork done to it? it is a common mistake to make the bottoms with out drtain holes...

 

[PJHunter]

it did have before i bought it and the fella that's done work on it has just replaced it. I think the drill will be coming out.