These trucks don't normally leak right? lol

So back in November I made the mistake of taking advantage of a complimentary Veteran's Day carwash. Big mistake. Today's car washes are not like the ones back in the day. Today's car washes have high pressure jets pointing every way possible! Water was coming in everywhere and my wife who was sitting in the passenger seat was not happy! knew that I needed to replace the seals around the door but wow.. I have new door seals to put in sometime in the near future.

I will also have to replace the radio antenna....

So a few weeks later I was doing something in the truck and realized that the padding under the floor liner was wet. I took out the seats and removed the padding and liner, dried the floor, etc. I also cleaned the entire cab but that's another post for later down the road.

So I figured that I would leave the floor bare for now so that I could check on water intrusion during/after it rained. Of course it did not rain for weeks!! When it did rain I checked the floor and it was wet in the corner of the pan closest to the accelerator pedal. So I reached up and felt the padding behind the liner along the firewall and it is wet.

The hood cowl lacing is missing and I will be ordering one when I am able to. I have put some tape over the mounting holes after I removed the old lacing clips but I assume that is not doing much but wanted to keep them covered until I can replace the lacing. I am just wondering if the missing cowl lacing would be the root cause of the water or if there is another common issue that would cause the intrusion?

Also, do I need to pull out the entire dash to dry out the padding or will it dry out without issue, once the intrusion is stopped of course? I am assuming I will have to pull out the dash to get to the padding and liner.

TIA

Ryan

 

Look at those holes, they are open into the cowl vent area, so blocking them does nothing. You may have leaking from the sealant used between various body parts or even rust? Another place is water running down the firewall under the hood falling on wires and running along the wire to inside the cab just above you feet, wires running through a grommet. I installed new hood seal, but first attempt the little metal clips tore out. Second attempt, I removed the metal and used 3/16" or 7/32" black plastic push pins.

That piece of rubber forms a trough that carries water across to the left or right fender aprons. I don't see water in mine now, but once I did.If raining.

If flooded with water like at a car wash or monsoon, yes .... most will go through the cowl vent to drain, but there's plenty of water running down between the hood and cowl, and that first pinch weld is below the area where that seal strip goes, and the lip of the pinch weld turns down to not hold water that does get by the seal or that runs off the hood opened with rain or wash water on it.

The cowl seal does two things. It forms a trough to redirect water running down behind the hood, off to the sides. It also reduces a path for coolant or smoke blowing up in front of the windshield as well as reducing a path for warmed air that might condense on the windshield fogging it up. If excessive water floods the seal, it has little drainage ditches like pressed in the firewall below.

Below that cowl seal are wires / linkages / hoses / cables too... running through grommets in holes in the firewall, and any water dripping onto them will seek low points before dropping off. Those grommets are not all water tight.

After you put new door seals in, etc, gonna be harder shutting doors too ... but an open window helps.

Here is that strip. Once all the clips were gone, I started at the center and worked towards the ends, punching holes in the rubber mount lip with a pair of hole punch pliars like used for adding holes in a belt, matching the holes in the truck. I did not glue it. Bought last one at Dennis Carpenter I think.



As to drying it out, I wouldn't remove my dash, but I would maybe set a fan in there in the floor, move some air, maybe leave doors open in a garage too, or at least the windows down .... but then I don't know how wet yours is. I know I totally removed my factory carpet and padding years and more years ago, (I also repaired my floors, reinstalled a rubber with bonded fibers industrial flooring product). Summer is coming.

 

After doing some more searching I found some posts about the cowl and have seen talk about cowl drains.

Does the 75 Ranger have cowl drains?

 

Yes, anything with a cowl vent does.

 

I guess that makes sense because I have never seen any standing water in the cowl. Hopefully a new cowl lacing/seal will resolve the issue and it is not anything else more complicated.

Ryan

 

I had a similar issue on my 78. I would get water leaking down the inside of the firewall right around the fuse box. It would actually drip water into the turn signal flashers at times, I had to replace a few that had been destroyed that way. Once I dug into it I found where the firewall meets the cowl there are 3 layers of metal that form the pinch weld that you can see just below the cowl lacing. The top layer is the the front of the cowl (that the lacing attached to), the bottom layer is the firewall, and the middle layer is the "floor" of the cowl area. This cowl "floor" is only visible from inside the cab, and a lot easer to access if the dash is out. In my case this middle "floor" layer was rusted right at the pinch weld and was allowing water draining from the cowl to leak down the inside of the firewall.

To fix it, I had to drill out the spot welds in this area, cut out a small section of the rusty floor, then slide a new section of metal in between the top and bottom layers and weld it back in place. I worry about rust coming back in this area, so i treated the pinch weld seam with Rust Blast metal prep and sprayed all 3 layers with weld through primer before welding the patch in place. The inside of the cowl is almost completely inaccessible but I was able to reach up in through the kick panel vent and smear seam sealer into the pinch weld area. I then sprayed rubberized under coating in between one of the cowl vent slots that seams to have coated the area pretty well. It no longer leaks and hopefully it stays that way.

 

I guess I should consider myself lucky. This year my '73 F100 went through two hurricanes and a modern automated car wash without getting a drop of water inside (but I also had to replace my radio aerial after the car wash -- d'oh!).

 

Wow. That ought to fix i! I hope mine clears up with a new cowl seal. I guess I will have to order that sooner rather than later.

I will probably have the dash out eventually when it is paint time but with the wife still looking for a job my progress has been slower than I would like. I will make sure to check that area when that happens and make repairs as needed.

I did notice last night that the water was a little "slippery" so I am thinking that it may be coming in at the master cylinder. I already have a new MC but just have not put it in yet. I have a felling that when I pull the MC off I may find an issue. At least that may be easier to rectify but we shall see.

 

The first two pics are after going thru the wash. I was able to put a little heat to it and make it close enough for now. The antenna is one of those parts that surprisingly is a lot more expensive than some of the other larger parts.

 

I don't think the cowl seal will make any difference with water getting inside the cab. It will slow water from dripping between the hood and cowl, but that water just drips off of the pinch weld onto the motor and inner fenders. The majority of the water coming off of the windshield runs down into the cowl area, which is technically on the inside of the firewall. If there is a compromise in the cowl area it will leak on the inside of the firewall.

If you have power brakes I don't think there is any way for the brake fluid to get inside of the firewall. If you don't have power brakes I can see it happening though, since the MC is bolted right to the firewall.

 

I feel your pain as I've been dealing with the same thing with my '74 F100. You are right to address this issue now - the issues associated with a water leak will only get worse as time goes on.

I absolutely would remove as much of the interior as needed to dry out the padding, and this will only help you in locating the leak. To find my leak, I removed most of the dash and poured water from a plastic pitcher at various locations until I was able to nail it down. Once the source of the water was determined, repair was fairly straightforward.

I had made a similar post to this a few months back, and one of the folks who responded suggested to me the cowl drain as has been done here. He told me the location of the drain outlet, and I located it and used a wire coat hanger to unstop the blockage. The drain outlet is located behind the front tire (one on either side, of course) further toward the center of the truck from the wheel well. If you'll lie on your back, scoot under the truck, and look straight up, the hole will be there. That isn't a bad place to start.

A.S.

 

That makes since.

No power brakes YET. I was wondering if there may have been a very small amount of fluid getting by the MC rod seal and then getting washed down with the water. I have a new MC but just have not put it on yet. I need to get a new firewall grommet before I do it.

Heck, it may have just been that I had something on the bottom of my shoe the other night coupled with colder temps that made it fell slippery.

I am just glad that I realized there is water getting in prior to it rusting out the already replaced floor pan!!

 

Where was the water entering from on your truck?

 

For clarity, the drains. .... this is driver side, I happened to have fenders off that day, but ..............

• I've lain on my back under it and reached the drains with my hand, reaching up behind the fender inner splash liner.

• I've also accessed the drains by pulling the trim / door in the kick panel and reaching in, then even with the nozzle of my small shop vac.

• I never tried it, but might be able to grab trash in them with a long bent wire with the door held open. This last one just occurred to me but I'm gonna try it when it warms up. Update 01-24-2025 .... Tried it just for kicks .... Yep,it can be done if the wire is bent right, just go in, lower, pull to rake trash out.

Passenger side is a mirror image




Thought it might help.

 

Thanks!!

That is a huge help for sure.

Is there a boot or any rubber in there?