water, water, everywhere...

[treed2 at wsu.edu (T. Reed)]

Sorry, i forgot to mention this is on the -outside- of the car that you're
lifting the seal up with your thumbs.

The gasket is an H-channel cross section, one part of the H goes on to the
glass and the other part goes on to the metal, like this:

      _____________			<-- outside of the car
--------+   |   +-----------
 metal  |   |   |  glass
--------+   |   +-----------
      ------+------			<-- inside of the car
          gasket


The water runs through the part where the XXX's are:

      _____________
--------+XXX|   +-----------
 metal  |XXX|   |  glass
--------+XXX|   +-----------
      ------+------
          gasket

At the corners of the seal, there is an air gap that forms when the seal
shrinks and water can fill this gap and run down through the channel to
bottom of the windshield seal on the inside where it drips down the
firewall and the back side of the dash. Unfortunately you can't see the
bottom side of the windshield seal because the dash is in the way.

You don't have to pull the dash to fix this; you just fill the channel
mentioned above with silicone (do this from the outside of the car)

As far as troubleshooting; you probably won't notice wetness under the
dash until it's really bad (at least I didn't) at which point my
electrical system began frying itself and I had to take the interior out
because in the abundance of moisture it was growing new (smelly)
lifeforms.

The best way to detect it is like I said by pulling up the seal on the
outside (it's a little difficult; you might want to use some wooden
popsicle sticks underneath to help you get a good grip on it) and checking
for rubber rot/shrinkage. Even if you can't see any, any wetness is
indicative of a problem.. the only place it has to go is down the gasket
channel and in to your interior.

It's almost never a leak between the glass and the gasket, as if it was
you would be able to clearly see the leak taking place (this gasket
surface is completely visible, inside and out)

HTH,

-Toby

On Mon, 16 Feb 2004, Michael Abatzis wrote:

> where do i look for water entry, so i can better troubleshoot? does the
> silicone go on the outer or inner side of the windshield? basically, is
> there a way to do this w/o removing the dash? thx,
> -m
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From:	"T. Reed" <treed2@wsu.edu>
> Sent:	Tuesday, February 17, 2004 4:56 AM
> To:	"Michael Abatzis" <abatzis2@hotmail.com>
> Cc:	"scirocco-l@scirocco.org" <scirocco-l@scirocco.org>
> Subject:	Re: water, water, everywhere...
>
> Classic leaky windshield symptoms. Grab the top corners of your windshield
> rubber seal with your thumbs and flip them up. You'll probably find that
> they are shrunken and sucked inwards, exposing a channel that fills with
> rainwater and floods neatly behind the dash and drains down in to the
> floorpan invisibly. The angle of your parking spot and the severity of
> the leak will determine which side (or both) gets wet.
>
> The cure is a new wind$hield $eal or a tube of black silicone neatly
> injected under the current seal.
>
> -Toby
>
> On Mon, 16 Feb 2004, Michael Abatzis wrote:
>
> > ugh. so after fixing my pass side door, and thinking that was my leak, i
> > come to my car after a couple days of rain and find the DRIVER'S side floor
> > soaked, front and back. pass side bone dry.  the door/sunroof drains i don't
> > think are the issue here. i've thought about a windshield leak, but a) it
> > was a LOT of water b) i would think pass side would get some water too c)
> > felt up around under the dash, didn't feel anything wet up there, and d) i'm
> > not ready to tear out my dash looking for leaks yet.  any other sources of
> > leaks? i looked under the plastic shield under the hood, and there was a bit
> > of water in the tray; the drains were clear, but there was still about
> > 1/8-1/4" standing water in there. didn't know if this was normal. could this
> > be a source of leaks? the air intake/fan shroud both look like they would be
> > susceptable. any thoughts?
> >
> > -Michael Abatzis
> > New Orleans!
> > 1988 Scirocco 2L 16v RIP
> > 1987 Scirocco 2L 16v...
> >
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