Passenger Footwell Water Ingress

[stevic]

I have checked the faq's and followed the instructions on this post, all seems OK and the water is running out freely.

 

The car has been standing mostly on flat ground, it isn't used much, so the water hasn't blown or splashed in. The carpet is only sodden in the well and there doesn't appear any damp patches on the sides and there is no indication of a drip or run.

 

Can you please help?

 

Steve

[gaznlou]

Steve

Might sound a silly question, but does your rear washers work? if not I think you might find, a broken/disconnected washer hose, that runs under the carpet

Gaz

[Rusty Nail]

Hi stevic

 

I would go with the rear washer pipe issue as 'gaznlou' suggested or failing that it must be the blocked scuttle drains.

 

Try those first and take it from there.

 

Good luck

[stevic]

Thanks for the replies.

 

I did remove the road wheel and wheel arch cover, the scuttle drain was clear and the two way flap thingy had obviously been removed at a previous time, water flowed well through the gap when I poured it over the windscreen.

 

I will check the rear washer pipe, but there was so much water in the well I suspect it's rain coming in, the water didn't smell of washer fluid either.

[stevic]

Further to my previous posts; the loom was stripped and the feed to the rear washer checked, there is no join at floor level, further inspection revealed a push fit connection adjacent to the glove box, all connections OK, no leaks here.

 

There is so much water in the seat well that it is hard to determine if water is coming in when I did a hose pipe test - I'll try again when the well dries out a bit. The scuttle drain is free and clear.

 

Is it possible that the torrential rain was too much for the scuttle drain? Could the windscreen be leaking and where would be the obvious place tto look when performing a hose pipe test?

[gaznlou]

Steve

Take a look at the attachment, hopefully this will solve your problem.

 

Water_collecting_in_the_front_foot_wells_or_under_the_front_seats.doc

 

Gaz

[stevic]

Gaz

 

Thanks mate, just the job, all printed off and I'll give it a good look at when this rain stops.

 

I've had to cut a square of the stuff under the carpet out (sort of a trap door) so that I can dry it out a bit better, the smell was a bit rank so it must have been leaking for some time. I have never noticed it before and we've had the car since August - strange. I thought it would have misted up with all that water sloshing around under the carpets.

 

Steve

[gaznlou]

No problem, your welcome.

[paulh]

Just be glad you have a newer Galaxy. I had the old mk1 shape and had blocked drains. The water poured in and went straight into the wells under the passenger seat, destroying the central locking control box. (Who in their right mind thought of putting electronis under there in the first place!) I came home from work to find my car sat in the pouring rain, both windows down and the central locking going ten to the dozen!

[mike634949]

Check for evidence of a replacement screen (fitters sticker, tax disc holder etc). Budget fitters rush the job and don't prepare the channels properly giving rise to leaks. Do not expect to see evidence of a leak around the screen itself. The water will track within the A pillar and within the dash.

 

Because the insulation under the carpet will absorb many pints of water it may be many months before the problem is noticed - thus the association with a replacement screen is overlooked.

 

Remove the A pillar cover trims within the footwells. Carefully feel within the box section for any drips / wetness . The leak may be small and the drips are therefore going to be infrequent.

 

Examine in the middle of steady rain. You can leave the trims off for a few days. Get upside down in the footwell with a torch !. A quick test with a hose lacks the persistent effect of rain & a small leak. Although a slow trickling hose may confirm things in due course.

 

The water can track to the opposite side to the leak especially if you are on a slope. Driving in the rain may not leak as the water is driven in different directions.

 

Roll back the rubber windscreen trim so that you can see how accurately the screen is centralised. The rubber seal does not keep the water out - that the job of the sealant bedding

 

I speak from experience and four trips to AutoGlass now thankfully resolved Good luck

 

Mike

[daddyfixit]

i had this with my 2000 tdi, there is a push fit connector next to the passenger seat, i lockwired the 2 pieces together after she who drives like no other, filled the nsf footwell up , then re-filled the washer bottle again to make double-sure!!!

 

then told me the windows mist up and the washers dont work????????

[stevic]

I took it to a local repair shop /body shop last week. They hosed it down with a power washer and a hosepipe with a lad squeezed under the glove compartment, nothing came in through the heater or on top of the carpet. The problem is under the sound proofing. I had hoped they would have removed this and done the job properly - no further work for them!

 

It could be a windscreen leak build up, I have now drilled a hole at the lowest point of the passenger floor pan, so any excess will drain away before it fills up the fotwell.

 

In the meantime I will keep stuffing newspaper under the soundproofing (where I cut the trap out) and blot up the ingress.

 

Cheers for the replies.

 

Steve

[jamesey]

have you checked all your door rubbers , mines a mk 1 seat and all my rubbers were rotton thus leaking in??? :lol:

[mike634949]

I still fancy the screen is leaking. your symptoms are exactly as I endured. The car especially filled up when standing in rain. The soundproofing will absorb a huge amount of water. I really recommend you get the footwell and upper A pillar trims off ... it really is almost impossible to spot otherwise. Is there any evidence of a replacement screen ?

[Henry C]

I had this problem on my high milage 96 Galaxy (windscreen obviously replaced several times before I bought it). The glue holding the screen in place had come unstuck down the side. From the inside you could slide a thin blade between the frame and the glass.

 

When the boot or doors were shut hard, the windscreen could be seen moving away from the frame - obviously a poor quality job last time the screen was replaced. A friendly local windscreen fitter managed to reseal it, from inside the car, without removing the screen or getting mastic on the trim.

 

Nice dry car now!

 

I've now raised the black box under the passenger seat further off the floor. If it floods, the sun roof opens to let more water in.

 

Hope this helps. Henry

[grahaml1500]

Might be worth looking at, but i had the same problem with a mk2 mondeo, and it was the pollen filter casing had split.

[gaznlou]

Steve

Adding to the link I sent previously, take a look at this link, hope this helps

Gaz

http://www.fordgalaxy.org.uk/ford/index.ph...ost&id=4358

[Horatio]

Steve

Take a look at the attachment, hopefully this will solve your problem.

 

Water_collecting_in_the_front_foot_wells_or_under_the_front_seats.doc

 

Gaz

 

Awesome info. Thanks! This adds another half a dozen possible leak sources to investigate!! Yet more work.......

[Horatio]

I posted this info on another thread here:

 

I'm taking a belt and braces approach to solving a passenger side foot-well 'pond' that has been appeared and re-appeared ever since I first owned the vehicle in 2001. Mine is a W reg 2.3 GLX.

 

For any others out there researching possible causes for their unwanted water feature/s, take heart. Before you can prevent your floor from becoming soaked, first you'll have to establish which leak/combination of leaks your car has. Mine has suffered from 5 different sources of leaks, seemingly these problems employ tag team tactics to annoy us. Must be the law of sod.

 

In order, here's a list of possibilities for you to investigate:

 

1) Windscreen leak - can effect both foot-wells and can easily interfere with your ECU, fitted under the driver's seat.

2) Pollen filter leak - effects the passenger foot-well, caused by incorrectly fitted pollen filter - where filter doesn't fit correctly over the seal.

3) Scuttle drains - these can become blocked, consequently the water pools and drains through the pollen filter or possibly elsewhere on the bulkhead.

4) Black plastic shrouds at base of windscreen, under the wipers - where these plug in need to be silicon sealed - 4 out of 6 reside over the occupant side of the bulkhead!! That's right - directly over your feet, behind the dash!!

5) Inner door seal/weather seal - the metal lip where it fits at the base of the door entrance can become rusty and irregularly shaped.

6) Sunroof - the drain pipe from this can become disconnected and needs to be refitted.

7) Rear washer pipe - as discussed here.

 

If anyone can add anything to this list, I would be most grateful - keeping my Galaxy dry is a work in progress.

 

Regards the underlay beneath the carpet - when it gets wet, the carpet above may in some cases remain dry. However, you'll notice the smell before too long and perpetual misting of the windscreen. Getting it dry is no easy task as the sound insulation material is a thick, dense, felt-like material. I removed the grey trim (about 4 or 5 screws concealed by removable plastic covers), lifted the carpet and used a stanley knife to cut through the rubber matting/underlay/felt. I cut as large an area as I could - right up under the dash, up to the centre console and back as far as the seat. The resultant mass of wet underlay easily weighs in excess of 20kg if it gets as saturated as mine did. It holds alot of water!

 

To get it dry - be patient. It's not going to happen over night. You don't want this thing corroding your floor pan or damaging your air-bag inflation charge, or the loom. The way I dried mine was to leave as much water run/drip away first - all day when the weather was fine, draped over a wall in direct sunshine, rubber side uppermost. Then I took it indoors - with permission from the missus. BE WARNED! You won't be able to hide this thing from your other half. I put it in the bath and used old towels to draw out moisture. Then when it just felt damp, I left it held up against an economy seven storage heater. It took 4-5 days to fully dry out.

 

Don't bother re-fitting it until you've convinced yourself (!) that there are no more leaks. Since 2003, I've had to remove this passenger side underlay 4 times. It's no joke.

 

I appreciate I'm new to the forum, bear with me whilst I air my sorrows! :lol:

[gaznlou]

Horatio

Go to Post called "Rear Arch" in Questions about the Galaxy, I added 2 download spread sheets, related to water ingress, Hopefully the MODs will add these to the Links

Gaz

[chris brown]

Had the same problem with our 1997 galaxy, turned out to be blocked water drains.

To check open the bonnet and shine a torch under the widscreen on the passenger side, in the corner you should see a drain hole which can become blocked with time.

Use a wire coat hanger to unblock and the water should run out of the wheel arch, you will also see a long air filter which is where the water gets in as it builds up dont forget to check the drivers side.

When this happened to ours I had thange the insulation under the carpet as it was soaked, Good Luck.

[sharan'n'tracey]

Just to add to the misery I have a high mile 96 sharan tdi, the quarter lights are held in their seals with steel clips, which as they rust expand and force the seal away from the glass, water leaks in along the three studs that hold the assembly in place. The pollen filter is a good one to look at for the main cause of the pond, ford have modified the frame that holds the filter in place and introduced some bits of foam that are stuck on the bulkhead to prevent crud blocking the little non return valves in the inner wings as part of the same modification. I cant think why you would stick sponges to a steel car to trap water against the metal and encourage the dreaded tin worm. I have removed the carpets, insulation and glove box, dusted the lot with talc and now I can see where the water tracks down over the buklhead now all I have to do is find where from......Deep joy. Just to make life easier on my car the front insulation is a single piece that runs across the whole width of the car under the gear selector cables, hand brake etc. not any more now its met Mr. Stanley knife. As lots of others have noticed boy does it soak up a whole lot of water. I have signs of rust in the foot well now, they say it never rains.

 

Thanks for everyone advice,

 

regards.