Water ingress solutions

[Lee Valleley]

Water ingress solutions...👌

As most of you've probably had or having various problems with water ingress from windows and doors I thought this may be of some help. 

After several weeks of persistent water ingress and soaking wet carpets Lotus finally got around to fitting new Interior and exterior door/window seals, followed by some adjustment to the windows, despite their efforts the problem hadn't been resolved🤬

Today I finally had some dry weather, so  removed the door cards,  sat inside the car whilst my wife poured a consistent stream of water along the windows..No leak found, we then directed the water to the top of the door edge where it meets the A Pillars. 

BOOM.. water was running in only after approx 30 seconds., finally now found the major source of the problem, while the doors are closed the water runs down the hinge side of the inner door and finds it way past the upper part of the seal then gets trapped resulting in it running into the floor. 

So I cut some rubber into lengths approx 10mm wide and 5mm thick, mounted this with 3m VHB tape to the inside edge of the door to create a secondary seal to divert the water away from the inner seal.

Before putting the door cards back, closed the doors, run the same water test again with a good consistent stream for a good 5 mins... Hallelujah problem solved,  no more wet carpets💯💫💥.

NOTE..
these are only a temporary set for now until I find some better quality rubber seals that I'll use permanently. 

Hope this is of some use foe some of you.

[mg4lotus]

Good sleuthing.

I've not had any problems during my ownership but if it does happen I'll know where to start looking.

[randomusername]

On 22/12/2023 at 18:41, Lee Valleley said:

BOOM.. water was running in only after approx 30 seconds., finally now found the major source of the problem, while the doors are closed the water runs down the hinge side of the inner door and finds it way past the upper part of the seal then gets trapped resulting in it running into the floor. 

Thanks for this - I've got a similar issue with mine if I park it in a certain spot on my drive, which is slightly angled down towards the drivers side. The water seems to come in about 3-4" back from the bottom curve of the hinge end of the passenger door seal - it looks like it's pooling in the seal and then coming over it onto the carpet. Is this where it was coming in in yours?

I've tried putting some neoprene seal along the door similar to how you have done, we will see if it helps any otherwise I'll be pulling the door cards off as well... 

[Lee Valleley]

Hey mate.

 

Yes this was exactly the same as my scenario,

I removed the door cards to ensure this was the main problem. 

I also found some very minor leaks from the rubber grommets that allow the wire loom through, simply sealed them with some rubber glazing sealant 

Also had some very minor ingress via the wing mirror interior trim, again just removed this and re fitted with some 10mm VHB tape.

The main cause was due to the door seal itself, we've had extremely heavy winds and rain here and its still all dry. 

[Jason Trevor]

I seem to have same problem just found soaking wet drivers floor mats ( GT410 Sport ) Will have to try this solution when I can be arsed ha ha 

[Cdm2018]

Any solution for my boot which doubles up as an aquarium ? 

[Lee Valleley]

It's a very simple job to do, no more than approx 20mins max

 

 

2 hours ago, Cdm2018 said:

Any solution for my boot which doubles up as an aquarium ? 

That's an easy one buddy, most likely the seal, have you adjusted the bump stops on the rear hatch.

Raise the rubber seal around the boot lid, gently close the hatch, water test etc.

If that's the problem it easy fixdd

[Cdm2018]

Done that but still no luck ! Adjusted the boot lid not replaced the boot hinges yet ? 

[Lee Valleley]

I doubt it would be the hinge, have you checked the seals around the spoiler?

[Phaeton91]

Do you park on a slope? Front higher than rear?

[Lee Valleley]

It's parked downward on the drive, no more than about 15°

Front facing down 

[Cdm2018]

Not sure of the gradient but yes it’s parked with the nose up as I reverse onto my drive as it much safer to pull of the drive front first 

[Phaeton91]

There are some drain holes at the rear of the boot on the top ledge (see photo).  These could be blocked and so with the car facing up hill will cause an overflow with any substantial flow of water running down the channels to the side of the hatch and towards the rear of the boot.  Easy to test with a bottle of water and the boot open. 

Another possibility is that the seal is the not making proper contact with the inside of the boot lid.  This is what @Lee Valleley would be alluding to with the bump stops.  If the tailgate is not putting sufficient pressure on the seal, water will come over the top of it.  You can check this by rubbing a line of chalk or failing that some peanut butter on the top of the seal, closing the tailgate and then checking for a perfect and consistent line in the inside of the tailgate once you open it again.

Failing all of that, have you confirmed it’s not coming from underneath - via a missing bolt or grommet perhaps?

[Cdm2018]

Bibs and Andy at a lotus event tried the bottles water and checking the seals etc and unfortunately still no result 😥

I will check the drain holes higher up as I only check the ones around bottom edge of the boot ! 
I might to replace the boot seal ? I seen water drip from bottom section of the glass panel so wondered if some sort of sealant was required ? 

[Alfa2Evora]

I'm still puzzling over the sodden carpets conundrum.

I tried the supplementary seal solution championed by @Lee Valleley on my S1 but sadly to no avail. If anything the problem has got worse because whereas before the water seemed to be making its way to the bottom of the door then tracking in under the sill trim panel before dropping down the bottom section of the A-panel into the footwell, it's now just pouring straight over the top of the sill trim panel if the regular puddle I find there is anything to go by.

So, it's back to a bit more head-scratching while the carpets remain nice and dry in the airing cupboard and I run around with all the alloy flooring panels exposed pretending I'm in an overgrown Elise, .

[Phaeton91]

On 13/01/2024 at 15:12, Cdm2018 said:

Bibs and Andy at a lotus event tried the bottles water and checking the seals etc and unfortunately still no result 😥

I will check the drain holes higher up as I only check the ones around bottom edge of the boot ! 
I might to replace the boot seal ? I seen water drip from bottom section of the glass panel so wondered if some sort of sealant was required ? 

When you look at the structure of the boot there are very few possibilities for water ingress so a process of elimination should expose the issue.  I’d start with removing all the carpets and leaving them out.  Do the “peanut butter test”.  I was taking the p**s but also serious.  Use Vaseline, chalk or whatever but you want to establish whether the seal is pushing up against the underside of the bootlid before replacing it.  Also check that there is no ingress from under the seal but seems that Bibs etc have tested that.  You don’t say if this happens only when stationary or when driving? Do you use a jet wash? Like you said, it doubles as an aquarium and in that case there’s limited points where water can come in or out.  You could for example tape small (1”-2”) sections of cloth to the inside of the boot and see which ones get wet and which stay dry?

[Lee Valleley]

10 hours ago, Alfa2Evora said:

I'm still puzzling over the sodden carpets conundrum.

I tried the supplementary seal solution championed by @Lee Valleley on my S1 but sadly to no avail. If anything the problem has got worse because whereas before the water seemed to be making its way to the bottom of the door then tracking in under the sill trim panel before dropping down the bottom section of the A-panel into the footwell, it's now just pouring straight over the top of the sill trim panel if the regular puddle I find there is anything to go by.

So, it's back to a bit more head-scratching while the carpets remain nice and dry in the airing cupboard and I run around with all the alloy flooring panels exposed pretending I'm in an overgrown Elise, .

Morning fella.

If that's not solved your problem then apologies if it's made it worse. 

There are some other areas that allow water in, when the door card is removed you should see some rubber grommets that seal around the wiring loom, water can find its way through them, run down the inside of the door card and drop out the bottom of the card itself. 

There's also 5 plastic rivets that hold the bottom of the door card in place, another inlet for water if it's coming in via the door.

Have you checked these areas with the door card removed?