RX300 - The Bullet Hole Leak - Mega-Thread - Updated with rebuild

[Coxy]

Hi Guys

Well, I posted in another topic due to leak in the back that I had thought I had fixed, I am back to say unfortunately it returned with a overpowering damp smell again (despite running an ozone generator for 2 hours in the car)

So determined to get to the source of the issue this time....

1. LH front passenger seatbelt damp again - I naturally think sunroof again and start stripping off the trim to look for water ingress/mould trails.

2. LH scuff plates off, bit dirty underneath but looks okay, door seals come off too. Again no surprises with those.

3. LH B pillar off hoping to find a trickle from sun roof to seatbelt coil (would answer wet seatbelt conundrum) - surprisingly, looks quite healthy inside, no signs of mould, mould smell or water marks.

4. Peel back carpet at the edges where possible - find the whole underlay SATURATED.

5. Start stripping back more trim to get more carpet up, the more carpet I can peel back the more water I find! Literally pools, not puddles, pools of water in the footwells (the body has peaks and troughs in it)

6. Pull some rubber grommets and start getting the water out.

7. Noticed on tracking back the water left a sandy/dirty trail which I trace back to the boot area.

8. Light clusters out - what do I find? What can only be described as a bullet hole underneath the LH light cluster. It's not uniform enough to be a intentionally drilled hole and would of taken some force to get through, as it stands I am still at a loss to understand how it got there... (pic shows hole and unadulterated right hand side of the same area for comparison)

9. Onwards and upwards. I test the hole by pouring water in it and sure enough it floods the insides. 

    9b. Treat the hole with rust inhibitor and anti rust primer. (Hammerite Kurust)

    9c. Plug the hole with a rubber grommet and silicone it up as much as poss. (Halfords grommet and granville sealent)

10. End up peeling back more carpet where possible but again more I peel back more dampy/mouldy/brown water I find.

11. Having enough at this point I remove all seats and completely strip the carpet out. 

11B. Pull out all rubber grommets where water is collecting and let her drain!

12. Wash down the bare metal with diluted bleach solution. Scrubbing off the mould where possible. Water keeps wringing out brown even after the 3rd pass.

13. Many passes later, spray the area with some decent household cleaner and final rinse out and wash through with clear water.

Carpet & it's sound absorption material is still drip drying in the garden but I reckon it's totalled, it's got mould in the absorbtion material. 

It's polythene backed so would of never dried out on it's own with the amount of water present and whilst it was a big job (4 hours) I am glad I did it. Going to get a new carpet and just fit it whilst I've got the opportunity.

I'm going to run it round bare for the moment just to ensure all leaks fixed.

Equipment used:

• Trim Removal - Flat blade screwdriver
• Light cluster - 10mm spanner and socket (tricky to get to, rachet spanner is ideal)
• B Pillar cover - 10mm socket
• Chairs removal - 14mm socket
• Seatbelt bolt - 14mm socket
• Center console - 10mm socket
• Granvile silicone sealent
• Halfords assorted grommets
• Araldite epoxy to fix broken lug on light cluster
• All purpose wipes
• Bleach and other cleaners

[PCM]

GOSH - hope it's sorted now.

AMAZING pictures...

Looks like you almost completely stripped the interior!

 

[Coxy]

Thank you. 

Me too, I'm prob going to hose test it in the next few days in all areas and watch for water trickling in (or hopefully not!)

Initally seemed daunting making the decision to strip back but you know what actually it was pretty easy. Each chair is only 4 bolts and three electrical connectors. The rears were easier as not electrics. Straight out then center console, 6 bolts some trim bits here and there and carpet up and out!

[Silversalmon]

There was a.ovely story going around in the late 70s and early 1980s about some poor chap who had been driven mad by a clicking from the rear of his Opel Senator, a very whizzy management car of the time. The dealers were at a total loss after a lot of checks. In the end they were given the go ahead to cut open a section of the rear of the body to find a steel ball bearing attached to the body by wire with a message to the effects "found it at last you capitalist basta..d'...

A period of great social unrest in the car industry. 

Wonder why on earth you had that gaping hole in the bodywork? Revenge from a disgruntled Japanese worker!

[Silversalmon]

PS, brilliant write up and most interesting. Good quality photos as well. Well done

[GrahamG]

I admire your thorough approach and wish you the best of luck. You certainly deserve to succeed.

May I suggest you check the pressure equalising valve is seated correctly. This allows pressure to escape when doors are closed. It is found on the nearside of my RX350 vertically located in a cut out in the body panel in the rear most corner and side of the car.  It is covered on the outside by the large plastic moulding of the bumper where it wraps around to the side of the car.

It is a black plastic moulding with soft rubber flaps acting as valves and is held in place by lugs which in my case were not seated correctly and allowed rain water to pour in.

[GrahamG]

I should have added that in my opinion that bullet hole could well account for the water ingress.

Regarding the hole through which the wires pass to the rear light fitting, that should have a large soft foam gasket for water proofing. On the nearside of mine this was missing and may also have allowed water in.

My car had suffered some minor damage at the nearside rear and the missing gasket and improperly located pressure relief valve may well have resulted from shoddy repair work.

[NemesisUK]

16 minutes ago, Silversalmon said:

Revenge from a disgruntled Japanese worker!

An oxymoron, surely? 

[Spacewagon52]

Well done!

Are there airbags in the seats?

Unplugging the seats is fairly simple?

Really hope you have found the problem - keep us posted. 

 

[Coxy]

35 minutes ago, Spacewagon52 said:

Well done!

Are there airbags in the seats?

Unplugging the seats is fairly simple?

Really hope you have found the problem - keep us posted. 

 

Apparently yes, I disconnected the Battery when removing the chair wiring harnesses just to be safe.

Unplugging is very simple, couldn't be easier. 3 typical automotive clip type connectors. The hardest part was actually un-doing the plastic clip holding the harness to the bottom of the chair!

[Coxy]

1 hour ago, GrahamG said:

I admire your thorough approach and wish you the best of luck. You certainly deserve to succeed.

May I suggest you check the pressure equalising valve is seated correctly. This allows pressure to escape when doors are closed. It is found on the nearside of my RX350 vertically located in a cut out in the body panel in the rear most corner and side of the car.  It is covered on the outside by the large plastic moulding of the bumper where it wraps around to the side of the car.

It is a black plastic moulding with soft rubber flaps acting as valves and is held in place by lugs which in my case were not seated correctly and allowed rain water to pour in.

 

Hi Graham, 

Thanks - tell me more about this, I want to make sure I've covered everything as I'm only doing this exercise once! Where exactly can I find it? Your description is good but my sense of direction from words is not great. 

Thanks in advance.

[GrahamG]

This photo shows the offside rear corner of the car and you can see the bottom of a rectangular black plastic box which is held in place in an aperture in the body shell with press fit lugs. I do not know what this box contains but it is in an identical position and of a similar size to the valve on the near side and like the valve if not seated properly would let in any amount of rain water.

I would advise any owner to check this area of these cars. In my case the floor area in this photo was clean and dry with no sign of rust so I left well alone. The other side was a different story but the good news was the tiny amount of rust despite the shallow pools of water. It must have been leaking for at least four years. The metal of the body shell does seem to be well protected on these cars despite the absence of any thick coating of traditional style rust proofer which you might find underneath a car. 

There is another source of water ingress that has caused problems for others and that is a faulty lap joint weld directly above the attachment of the rear door air struts to the body. The weld runs across the gutter the edge of the rear door sits in when closed. Any sign of a crack there and I would scrap away the paint and apply sealant. 

[Coxy]

Thanks Graham, good info.

I called Lexus today on replacement carpet, £1500 and wait time till early April (ETA)

Pricey.

[Coxy]

• Had carpets out on Thursday.
• Full rinse down with cold water in the garden to remove initial dirt
• Deep shampoo with high quality carpet shampoo and degreaser
• Rinse through repeated as above until water running clear from carpet and sound absorption material.
• Final rinse with very hot water.
• Above washing time in total. 120 Minutes.
• Drip dry 
• Then hung in small room with heater and dehumid.
• Carpets hopefully going back in today. Will take some pics of re-installation.

Word to the wise - if you ever have a substantial ingress of water into your RX enough that it affects the sound absorption material under the carpet I would urge you to remove and dry the carpet properly.

Put it this way, it's taken 3 days of drying in a 90 degree room with a de humid on flat out to fully dry that sound absorption material it's so thick. 

If like me you initially thought it would dry out naturally in the car whilst running around with the heaters on then you are very much mistaken, as I was.

As well as noting there are no natural vent areas on the floor pan coupled with the fact the carpet is polyurethane/similar backed means almost zero possibility for moisture to escape adequately enough. 

No wonder it was so stagnant. 

[Farqui]

Crumbs what a job, damp carpet really can honk.

Well done getting it sorted.

[Coxy]

After I believe I have now fixed a surprise and hopefully final leak (alt thread here) I've prepared the car for a good return to it's better self tomorrow and will start getting the carpet in and then putting everything else back in.

• Floor pan has been washed and scrubbed then once dry I went over it with some freshening deodorising spray. It didn't smell but I wanted to get it fresh from the ground up.
• The drain plugs dotted around were all pulled and washed in warm soapy water then dried and touched up with a spot of silicone lubricant to help longevity and avoid them drying out. 

Will post more pics as I go hopefully.

 

Now is that a good looking floor pan or what..?!

 

[GrahamG]

Yes, a very pretty sight but I bet you never want to see it again.

Very useful reference photos for the rest of us.

Just out of interest does anyone know what is the 9" diam circular cone shaped metal dish with a black pipe exiting the centre located on rear floor pan?

[Coxy]

1 hour ago, GrahamG said:

Yes, a very pretty sight but I bet you never want to see it again.

Very useful reference photos for the rest of us.

Just out of interest does anyone know what is the 9" diam circular cone shaped metal dish with a black pipe exiting the centre located on rear floor pan?

Sub woofer Graham. 

[Coxy]

The rebuild

First up with the floor pan out it's a good time to make sure the floor pan is clear of ANYTHING that is not part of the pan.

Nothing like laying the whole carpet down to find later on you left a rogue socket in the middle or whatnot.

First off treated a bit of rust from a bracket - whilst I can.

Next up carpet offered up via the boot and loosely sized up to it's appropriate areas and making sure to pull the electric seal harnesses through the correct holes as pictured.

Then the carpet staple edge clips.

These twist 90 degrees to come out but can be tricky due to the loom being in the way so I left them in and just pried the staples up. This mean I just fed the staples back through the original points and peened them over tight with the back of a screwdriver handle. 

By this point I had shoved the carpet into it's corners and crevices as much as possible including tucking the edges under the loom at each edge as per original.

Then I tackled the rear arch trim as this plays a good part in holding the carpet edges down at the rear half. 

This was also a good opportunity to clean each trim piece in isolation before fitting

Note the door seal currently in place here, this needs to be pulled back to allow proper fitting of trim panel.

Door seal needs to be removed for these panels to fit correctly as circled in the red they need to be flush with the door body lip as the seal holds them in place with a couple internal trim push fasteners.

Fitted. Just need to pop some trim fastens in at the rear but leave that till later as some trim panels overlap and only use the one fastener and they are a bitch to get out in one piece sometimes.

Next up was the seatbelt bolts - note I have put these back in before fitting the B pillar trim which the seatbelt needs to go through you would refit the B pillar trim in this section - reason am not is the velour/fuzzy coating on my b panel trims each side has peeled very badly so I've ordered two new ones but didn't want that to stop the rebuild today as they are easy to fit so I just cracked on without for the moment. 

Set torque to factory 42nm - note please check your own torque settings, I found a tech manual for RX300 1st Gen but I am happy to take my own life in my hands but would urge everyone to check and double check their own torque requirements for bolts as important as the seat belt and chairs. 

Next up center console tray - make sure the wiring is correctly routed, don't forget the 12v socket connector

It's largely sat on 3 green clips and 2 screws confirm fitment on top. Also don't forget the rear blower vent at this stage.

Then just installed centre console on top - very easy, 6 10mm bolts. Again remember the connectors for and the one for the cubby hole & cup holder light.

Also don't forget the pull cable on the otherside of the bracket that enables the centre console to move forward and back!

Drivers chair in

Tilted back to aid re-connecting the connectors.

Note I disconnected the Battery at this stage due to the airbags, I don't know if it makes a different or not but why take the risk

Connected plugs. Don't forget to clip up the loom to the under chair clip circled. This avoids your loom being eaten or caught up by the chair mechanics underneath,

I dropped two bots in at the rear as that rail was exposed from last position I left the seat. You have to reconnect the Battery move the seat back and drop in the other two bots - I hand tightened after all in before torquing to correct spec once all in.

Then rinse and repeat for passenger side.

Then the rears - easier to get in when folded. Sorry crap pic here. 

Don't forget a little white stretchy harness for each L and R rear seat, it helps support the seat when folded and screws in with a 10mm bolt - there are two of them in total. No pictured sorry.

Once all torqued up - check and double check, don't take chances with seats! 

Now's a good time to push those rear trim fasteners in. Now you can see the overlap. 

Flip that MDF panel back down and you can now seat it properly with those clips

That's largely it! Few more pieces like those B Pillars that I'll do when the new ones arrive, front kick panels that are a piece of cake and the scuff plates I'll do when the b pillars are in as would only have to take it off again otherwise to fit.

 

Voila. 

Rains due this evening... I hope this worked cause the car smells and looks as fresh as a daisy now!

 

 

 

[Normski]

What a cracking write up! Glad you managed to take it apart and fix it back. Hats off to you :) Here's hoping all stays dry...

[Farqui]

Ditto, looks like a good project and that you've done really well 

[chesterman]

Excellent job.   Very informative thread.   Thank you.

[Silversalmon]

Absolutely brilliant, and the photos made it so much more interesting. Well done.

[lockeyboy]

Incredible effort and the write up is great too

good luck

[DanD]

Congratulations.

Hopefully this will be the end of your troubles. Well done.