I need help with an elusive water leak - RF floorboard

[SnowDrifter]

Ok so this one's pissing me off.

Standard water leak. When it rains, passenger floorboard gets wet. It's slow. Real slow. Maybe 1.5oz per 24h of rain. I cannot, for the life of me, find where it's coming from. I can see the lowest point where it's dripping from, but can't seem to trace it higher than that.

I'd say everything I checked is fine but that's clearly not the case. Everything I check appears fine. Inspected door seal, sunroof drain, windshield. They appear dry. Pulled off the dash cover on the passenger side and that's dry as well. So I'm back to start now - trying to find it.

Reallllllly hoping one of y'all can lend a hand with methods or spots to check that perhaps I'm missing. Because barring that, I feel I'm at the point of pulling the dash out just to be able to lay eyes on things. And **** doing that.

It drips down to one of the wires coming out from under the dash. See pic below: Looking up into the passenger side from footwell.

And yes, I have confirmed it's water, not coolant. It happens when the vehicle sits and it's raining for the better part of the day. Not related to a/c use.

Can't seem to replicate it with a garden hose - had the thing spraying and soaking for three hours and didn't observe the leak.

 

[SnowDrifter]

Ok so I tore into it again after clearing my head.

Made some(?) progress?

Thought it was the windshield. But I traced it up and it's coming from BETWEEN the body panels on the top right corner of the windshield.

Antenna perhaps? Not sure which side is GPS and which is sat-radio. Which one's on the passenger side?

And how to they secure? I have some sealer with me but I've never had to pull one of those things off before so I'm rather clueless here. I didn't see any obvious clips or screws on the top end. Need to drop headliner to get to it?

 

[Big Mama]

That’s a weird one to say the least. You can see the factory sealer along the joint but how/why did that come off? Can you get your hand or finger or an rtv spout up there? I’m sure they sell the factory seal somewhere but wouldn’t rtv fix it if you can reach it?

 

[SnowDrifter]

That’s a weird one to say the least. You can see the factory sealer along the joint but how/why did that come off? Can you get your hand or finger or an rtv spout up there? I’m sure they sell the factory seal somewhere but wouldn’t rtv fix it if you can reach it?

Not sure I follow with the sealer thing?

 

[Big Mama]

If I zoom in on the pic there’s what looks like a black seem sealer to the left of the arrows? Or is that from the headliner? The arrows seem to point to a split in the metal or am I not seeing it right?

 

[SnowDrifter]

If I zoom in on the pic there’s what looks like a black seem sealer to the left of the arrows? Or is that from the headliner? The arrows seem to point to a split in the metal or am I not seeing it right?

Ohh

The sealer is from the windshield. The arrows point to a gap in the body panels presumably where the roof meets roof braces and whatnot. But yeah there's no sealer where it is, just a gap between metal sheets. Current theory being it's the antenna because I'm really not sure where else it could come from regarding that. Just need to figure out how to take the thing off and seal it up. Hope I don't need to drop the headliner, don't have any decent weather for a minute

 

[mountie]

That’s a weird one to say the least. You can see the factory sealer along the joint but how/why did that come off? Can you get your hand or finger or an rtv spout up there? I’m sure they sell the factory seal somewhere but wouldn’t rtv fix it if you can reach it?

To left of arrows..... That black stuff looks like "over-flow" sealant/rubber from the seal ABOVE the metal/silver body seam in photo. The metal seam looks 'wavy' ... (bent).... a factory defect at the edge?

Possibly the windshield was replaced and the removal/install damaged the edge?

I wonder how long that water leak has been there??

GM does sell a very good RUBBER black sealer. ( Better than RTV )

 

[SnowDrifter]

Yeah windshield was replaced a couple years ago. Leak is new as of this winter.

Seam is symmetrical on other side and neither show signs of prying or other damage. I think that's just how it is.


Anyway... Had a break in the weather. Tossed some of the good stuff around the antennas for now as I won't have the time to drop the headliner for a few weeks.

Guess if it's fixed we know it's the antenna. If not then something else

Used butyl rubber if anyone's wondering

 

[mountie]

Well, if that doesn't fix the leak, you can always put a wrap on your Tahoe !

 

[SnowDrifter]

Well, if that doesn't fix the leak, you can always put a wrap on your Tahoe !