I was gonna say the forum's been quiet for a few days now. Is everybody wrapped up in Christmas stuff or what? Then some new threads pop up!
Anyway, have a good Christmas one and all (including your Bs). Mine's all wrapped up, awaiting rear bumper repair. See you somewhere next year.


Cheers!

I'd love to say mine's all wrapped up but I'm in the middle of an exhaust replacement at the moment, on our driveway in what seems like constant foggy rain. And just to add to the gloom, the replacement itself is going okay but at the weekend I noticed rust in the floor below the passenger footwell, near where the panel joins the sill assembly (and near the jacking point). Looks like there's been rust in the equivalent area on the driver's side which has been plated at some point. Probably going to have to strip back some more underseal to see how far it goes (and/or look from in the cabin, beneath the rubber floor covering) and then book it in with someone in the new year. At least my rear arches are fine, hopefully the repairs won't be as complex as that job seems to be - anyone else had to do repairs in this floor area ?

I hope everyone had a great Christmas, with family and friends. I was a little late getting the last repair done(inner CV boot) and lost my winter storage so the little car is covered well and relatively warm in my garage. Unfortunately my wife's camry is stuck outside with my pickup. It's been unusually cold this December, minus 30 Celsius night time temps, so it may be staying put. Anyway have a happy new year, everyone, play safe.

I had the same problem in the passenger footwell. I found the problem to be water seeping through the window seals and getting under the floor covering, staying there and just eating away at the steel. It’s all welded and undersealed now, I also used black duct tape to seal the floor covering to the body making it watertight. I’ll check the drivers side come spring.

Getting water in a "B" is a big issue and what is more getting in under the contiguous moulded internal flooring is not easy.

To avoid a total internal internal gutting of the car for drying out and access purposes I made a clinical horizontal cut across the flooring on top of the central rib/low bulkhead that runs across the car just underneath the seats.

When this is done and the sill trims removed then you can far more easily lift the floor for drying out. With a little extra work (seats and centre/rear armrest) the whole rear half of the flooring can be removed for complete access.

We never see/notice the horizontal cut because 95%+ is hidden. You just set an inch long clean cut by the fuel cut-off switch (ditto other side).

The problem we had with water getting into the car was due to water coming off the rear wing and hood cover getting in past the seals, especially when parked on a slope or in windy conditions.

The water would then run across and down the bodywork surface profiles to target and run off the surface by the seat belt plastic shrouds. From there some would go onto the rear bulkhead and flow into the hood well and the rest would go down the front of the bulkhead, behind the trim panel and in under the rear floor.

I did to 3 mods to make life much easier for when water gets in.

1) Cut and removed the bottom of the hood well lining. Replace with folded black towel. Any water in there is easily mopped up and dried out.

2) Completely covered and water proof taped in a polythene sheet/membrane the whole of the top of the bulkhead, down the front and side to just extend over the top edge of the rear flooring. This is just visually covered by the back panel trim when replace. Now any water that runs down the bulkhead runs over the membrane and drains into the TOP SIDE of the rear flooring (which already has well sections to collect water) instead of going under the flooring.

3) Using the bottoms of 2 litre milk bottle a fashioned a water guide and tray that goes under the inner lip of the rubber seal behind the seat belt and sits on top of the bulkhead. Any water now entering there is guided into the hood storage well thus minimising that which would have otherwise run down the front of the bulkhead. Last trick was to put some sponge in the bottom of the milk bottle trays to absorb and evaporate any small amounts of water.

What I also found was that any water getting into the rear or the front can travel the whole length of the car. For use the front edges/side of the flooring were all dry (indicating no water from screen/bulkhead/door/sill areas but the bottom water totally damp and soggy. All the water that had come in via the rear migrated pretty much well into the whole of the front floor section.

Just to add to the last post, I found if the tubes that drain the gutter behind the rear of the hood get blocked slightly, water entered the hood well inside. Especially on an incline like my driveway.

eramosa said:

It's been unusually cold this December, minus 30 Celsius night time temps

Click to expand...

Minus 30c Bl##dy Hell! Where are you?

Google Toronto, Canada, head north west 100 K, Find the city of Guelph, head straight east on Hwy7, 10K. I'm in the village of Rockwood, Ontario. My good friend Freddy, and his family who live up in Barrie, Ont. are dealing with even more severe weather than we are. We purchased our Barchettas, together from the same importer and are really enjoying them. Both are 98 models from Japan, with super low Ks. But like most things Italian, are gorgeous but very high maintenance.:

Happy New Year !! And thanks for the feedback on the floor rust/water issues. I had already made some changes to the rear bulkhead area after buying the car as I could see that the hood was leaky and water had been gathering in that area (I soon bought a hardtop to stop any further ingress which seems to have worked, once the windows were adjusted to sit tightly against its seals). So when I noticed the rust in the off-side floor area recently I assumed that the cause would have been old water trapped between the rubber flooring and the metal floor but it actually seems to have started below the car. The metalwork seems to be double-skinned in that area and the lower skin has rusted near the front jacking point but the panel above it (which you can see through the rust hole in the lower skin, and which would have had any internal water sitting on it beneath the rubber coating) seems okay. I wasn't expecting to find two layers of metal in that area but perhaps there has been some earlier plating which has resulted in there being two layers. Anyway the rust hasn't yet spread from the floor into the sill as far as I can see, so I'm hoping a section repair in that area won't be too demanding...

Had to get a patch welded driver side footwell behind front seat where plastic bung was..looks like it leaked and water lay there...passed mot no problem after patch welded in...