Bit of a shock today.
Whilst preparing Ruby for Quay For My Car on Poole Quay, found ourselves vacuuming water instead of dust from carpet in driver's front footwell!
Instant depression set in, hate water leaks, tricky to locate, fix and dry car out after + potential damage.
The one thing that was positive was the amount of water, level up to the carpet, press down with fingers and carpet is absolutely saturated. Yes we had just washed her with hose pipe but no sign of water dripping in, haven't hose washed her for ages as love Meguiars waterless wash and apart from the huge downpour the same time which she missed ,because she was under cover at this time, it hadn't rained for weeks!
So where has all this come from ? It wasn't damp, it was a small flood.
Water was nice and clear, so not coolant from heater.
Drain from air con was first suspect, looked underneath with air con on and engine running, only to be disappointed to see water dripping from pipe underneath and could even feel the air blowing out of the hose too. Where could the water be coming from?
Decided it would be best to dry carpet out first to prevent damage, so stated taking out trim, first piece out was the clutch foot rest part on lower side of centre console.
Relief, upon removal the problem became clear. Water was coming from air con drain!
Fiat use a very cheap and nasty way of attaching the drain hose to the pipe on the heater box (hopefully photo will show better than I can explain) The rubber hose has a rectangular 'slice' removed from it which is designed to hang the hose onto a 'lug' on the pipe. Unfortunately either it has been knocked (although well protected behind trim panel) or the method of attachment is poor allowing the hose to drop slightly. Not enough for the hose to fall off but sufficient to allow water to drip out of the slit on the hose from the end of the pipe.
The fix (also shown in photos) is to push hose up to ensure that the end of the pipe is past the slit and attach properly to prevent it sliding down again, Jubilee style hose clip seems to have done the trick there.
All that remains now is to remove and dry carpet/sound deadening! At least hot weather should help there.
Sorry for long post, but hopefully might be useful to some of you and might well be worth looking at upgrading your hose attachment for peace of mind.
Whilst preparing Ruby for Quay For My Car on Poole Quay, found ourselves vacuuming water instead of dust from carpet in driver's front footwell!
Instant depression set in, hate water leaks, tricky to locate, fix and dry car out after + potential damage.
The one thing that was positive was the amount of water, level up to the carpet, press down with fingers and carpet is absolutely saturated. Yes we had just washed her with hose pipe but no sign of water dripping in, haven't hose washed her for ages as love Meguiars waterless wash and apart from the huge downpour the same time which she missed ,because she was under cover at this time, it hadn't rained for weeks!
So where has all this come from ? It wasn't damp, it was a small flood.
Water was nice and clear, so not coolant from heater.
Drain from air con was first suspect, looked underneath with air con on and engine running, only to be disappointed to see water dripping from pipe underneath and could even feel the air blowing out of the hose too. Where could the water be coming from?
Decided it would be best to dry carpet out first to prevent damage, so stated taking out trim, first piece out was the clutch foot rest part on lower side of centre console.
Relief, upon removal the problem became clear. Water was coming from air con drain!
Fiat use a very cheap and nasty way of attaching the drain hose to the pipe on the heater box (hopefully photo will show better than I can explain) The rubber hose has a rectangular 'slice' removed from it which is designed to hang the hose onto a 'lug' on the pipe. Unfortunately either it has been knocked (although well protected behind trim panel) or the method of attachment is poor allowing the hose to drop slightly. Not enough for the hose to fall off but sufficient to allow water to drip out of the slit on the hose from the end of the pipe.
The fix (also shown in photos) is to push hose up to ensure that the end of the pipe is past the slit and attach properly to prevent it sliding down again, Jubilee style hose clip seems to have done the trick there.
All that remains now is to remove and dry carpet/sound deadening! At least hot weather should help there.
Sorry for long post, but hopefully might be useful to some of you and might well be worth looking at upgrading your hose attachment for peace of mind.