Drying up standing water

[red93gagt]

My 93 GA GT leaks water if it gets parked in the rain for a long time. Today it rained all day while I was at school and when I got in my car after school to leave, there was about a 1/2 - 3/4 of an inch of water on my front, driver's side floor. At work, I used our steam cleaner to vacuum up as much of the water as I could, although by the time I got home about 15 minutes later, there was about 1/4 inch of water that had seeped up from my obviously saturated carpet pad. So my question is, what is the best way to clean this mess out of my carpet? I think I am going to have to take out my driver's side seat and take out all of the trim on the driver's side so that I can pull up the carpet and try to dry out the carpet pad. What should I do to get rid of the moldy/feet kind of smell that is eminating from my carpet? It's embarassing. I never want to drive people anywhere because my car smells like ass. If it helps, I have access to a carpet steamer and cleaning chemicals at work, so I'm probably going to use that on my whole car. It could use it.

Thanks

Kurtis
red93gagt

[master]

Why don't you try to fix the leak first before you worry about drying the carpets? Get to the heart of the problem, don't just treat the symptoms.

[red93gagt]

I (hopefully) fixed the problem last Sunday, may 11. Under the front, outside defroster vent, there's a drain that all the water that goes in there can drain through. Right next to that there was a big rusted crack. My dad and I filled that in with some special type of caulking. It was this silvery colored stuff. Anyways, that should do it. So now I'm up to damage recovery. When we fixed the crack, I took out my driver's side seat and pulled up the carpet and shopvac'd all the water out from under it and I squeezed out the carpet pad and vacuumed out that too. Then I sprayed Febreeze all over under the carpet and then sprayed more on top of the carpet. I'm just wondering if there's anything else I should be doing. The carpet pad didn't look or smell moldy, but should I still be concerned about mold? I've been leaving my window open during the day and it seems to be slowly drying up.

Kurtis
red93gagt

[Hangerrat72]

Best thing to fully dry off your pads (and this may take some time) Try using a hair dryer....that way for sure you won't have to worry how many more day's you'll have to leave your window open till it's fully dry....(just a suggestion)

[HondaCivicsSuck]

Mine does the same thing, but it does it on the other side... drivers side :( i took it some where and they still didnt fix it

[red93gagt]

Does your car leak water in on the driver's side? or the passenger. Mine used to leak in on the driver's side.

kurtis
red93gagt

[HondaCivicsSuck]

both


Joe

[97grandamchick]

hey, i read somewhere that when ur car leaks water like that, it can get into ur airbag module(i think that is what its called) and itll screw up ur airbag, and then itll deploy at anytime without any notice...u can just be drving along and BAM, an airbag will be in ur face without makin any contact with anything....i read that a guy was driving his grand am with his son and his went off, and he veered into the other lane and recovered before anyone was hurt, but his arm was hurt or something like that...but since urs is leaking, its something you should think about. i read it somewhere....but i forgots where..ill look for it, if i find it, ill post it.

[97grandamchick]

hmmmm, now that i see what year car u have, and i think about it, does ur car even have airbags? anyways, even if you do or dont, if someone else has this problem, i found the link...

Story about airbag (http://www.gaownersclub.com/forum/showthread.php?threadid=5800&highlight=airbag)

[red93gagt]

I don't have airbags, but I think that joe (HondaCivicsSuck) does. He should worry about that. Man, that would suck to catch an airbag to the face for no reason. That would scare the shit out of me. Joe, have you tried removing your outside defroster vent to see if there's any cracks or anything? Thats where my GA was leaking water. There was a good sized crack right next to the drain for the outside defroster vent.

later
Kurtis
red93gagt

[HondaCivicsSuck]

yes i have airbags.... :( but where to i find this vent :???:

Joe

[red93gagt]

You need to remove the windshield wiper arms to remove the cover for the outside defroster vent. It's the big plastic vent that is at the bottom of your windshield on the outside. After you remove the wiper arms, there's a bunch of screws holding the vent cover in place. Remove them all and carefully remove the vent cover. It's really flimsy and feels like it will break very easily. After that's out of the way, you'll see that under that is like a big tray kind of thing. it goes the width of the car. On the driver's side of that, there's a hole with a flap attached to it. that's where all of the water that collects in this tray is supposed to go. On my car, right next to this drain was a big rusty looking crack where some stuff was welded at the factory. My dad put some caulking in there that is made for metal (I think. I didn't see the name of it, but when it was dry, it was silver in color) I'd be willing to bet that your car has a crack in the same general location. Before you patch it though, make sure that the area is clean and very dry. Check along the whole tray thing to make sure that there aren't any more cracks or holes that shouldn't be there. After that, put everything back where it came from and make sure that you're carefull when you reinstall your windshield wiper arms.

As far as cleaning up the water inside of your car, you will be better of just doing what I had to do. I removed the front seat (or in your case, seats) and then the trim that goes along the door sill on the inside and then just pulled up my carpet and started shop-vac'ing. I think you might be better/safer to just disconnect your battery first, since the stuff for your airbags is located on the floor on the driver's side. It's always best to just disconnect the battery when you might be dealing with anything that has to do with the SRS system. Be sure to squeeze as much water as possible out of your carpet pads and vacuum it up. Spray a lot of Febreeze or car deoderizer under your carpet when you get as much of the water out from under there. Then just lay your carpet back down and put the trim pieces back in. This is kind of a pain in the ass because you need to get all of the screw holes to line up with the holes they were in on the carpet. Then put your seats back in, but vacuum where they go first, just because it's easier when they aren't there. then vacuum your carpet and Febreeze it and then don't put your floor mats back in until your carpet is dry a couple of days later. I would roll the windows down just a crack and then turn the heater on high and have it blowing on the carpet and just let my car idle for like a half an hour everyonce in a while, since hot water evaporates faster. You're going to need to leave your windows open as much as possible until your car dries up. I found that it works best to just leave them open like 2 or 3 inches because that way, the sun still heated my car up a lot, but the humid air inside of my car could still escape through the window.

Sorry for the super long post, but I hope it helps.
Kurtis
red93gagt

[HondaCivicsSuck]

i know my car but am not going to try to fix that myself... i think i might take it back to the dealer... If this has happen to that guy. why dont GM recall it

[red93gagt]

I think that GM doesn't recall all of these vehicles because they are getting to be kind of old and by the time that all of these cars started leaking water in, they were past their warranty expiration date. That still doesn't mean that GM shouldn't recall these GA's. That is totally a safety issue and it needs to be addressed otherwise GM could be facing some serious lawsuits. This could almost turn into another Firestone type of situation. Especially if it were to cause any fatalities. Stupid GM. They're always looking for a way to make things cheaper.

Kurtis

[HondaCivicsSuck]

so do you think i should go to the dealer?

[red93gagt]

I would go to a dealer or a trusted mechanic to see what should be done to ensure that your airbag doesn't go off and kick your ass unexpectedly. As for the leak in your car, you should be able to fix that yourself. I fixed mine. It only took about 2 and 1/2 hours to fix the leak and clean up most of the water in my car. I've noticed lately that my car has a really faint kind of funky smell to it. I think I'm going to pull up my carpet again to Febreeze it again. Good luck
Kurtis
red93gagt

[Agquadon]

best way to dry up standing water is a shop vac and a hair dryer