Interior Leak/Flooding

**Jrew359** · 09-14-2011, 10:21 AM

Help! After a hurricane and then 4 days of rain I checked on my wife`s car (which is rarely driven) and found about ½ inch of water on the driver side of the cockpit. After I shop vac-ed what I could I found a drain plug. I hadn`t planned to redo the upholstery just yet but that might change now. Anybody have any advice on how to get the carpet dried out before the next storm? (Thankfully there are none in the forecast right now.)

Thanks,
Jrew

**Stokdgs** · 09-14-2011, 10:35 AM

Sorry to hear this happened to your wife`s car - what is the make and model?
About the only thing you can do if you cant pull out all the carpeting and padding, is to blow air on the carpet with a fan, hopefully, outside, all doors and windows open, until it dries.
I hear that some Detailers like to dry out Client`s cars by running the engine and turning on the heater full heat, full fan speed, so perhaps you can do this?
If you can get an AirMover type fan in there (like the carpet guys use when they do your carpeting, that will help direct air exactly on that spot.
They sell small ones like this at Home Depot, and Amazon..

Good luck with this.
Dan F

**Jrew359** · 09-14-2011, 12:01 PM

It`s her `88 Honda Prelude. She got it on her 16th birthday. It`s got less that 100K miles on it but unfortunately has always been parked outside.

**opie_7afe** · 09-14-2011, 04:58 PM

first thing i would do is remove water, then i would remove some of the interior panels to see if you see any water drip marks, with a leak i bet it will have marks where you can trace where the water is leaking from, check all the rubber seals also, look for rust spots. its the best advice i can give you..is this the first time it has happened? if so maybe she didn`t shut the door all the way? or maybe a rubber seal got out of place and just needs to be set back in place...maybe you could go on some honda/prelude forums and ask them if anyone else has this issue...

**Jrew359** · 09-15-2011, 07:42 AM

Thanks guys.
I believe this was the first time that its leaked. We were hit pretty hard by Irene and a few days later we had 4 days of rain when tropical storm Lee came up the Eastern states.
I took a quick look at the seals and windows. I didn`t find anything on my first check but will be checking again asap. I was able to dry it quite a bit by leaving the doors open for a long time on a couple back to back sunny, warm days. I will also reconnect the battery to confirm the windows are up (batt is on trickle charge right now).
If I can`t easily find the leak I have a plan B: I`ll have my son (3½ yrs old) sit in the car while I hose it down a little. He`ll think this is great fun!
I`ll let you know how it turns out!

**scottsvette** · 12-09-2011, 11:58 PM

Hey Jrew359, My wifes Tauras had leaked due to a problem with the wiper cowl. Anyway I pulled the area of carpet affected and put our de humidifier in for a while and it worked very well. We also use this process at work. Best of luck.