Just noticed today that there is water leaking under the rear seats. Any ideas how water is getting inside the car?

 

there is a grommet under the seat that causes this. there is a service bulletin on it... Someone posted about it about a month or two ago, search for the thread, that has the link with it.

 

Here is a service bulletin that might be your issue.

http://www.in.honda.com/Rjanisis/pubs/SN/B050400.PDF

 

Ah, thanks for the link. There is a lot of water under the seats. I'm worried it's going to ruin the seat itself. Will Acura fix the problem even if your car is not under warranty or is this something I'm going to have to do?

 

TSB's will be done even if you're outside of your warranty.

 

Beautiful. Last stupid question -- the closest Acura dealer is 3 hours away. However, there is a Honda dealer right down the road. Will they take care of it? I'm assuming/hoping so.

 

Depends on the dealer. My local acura dealer just recently put a banner out from stating "we now service honda vehicles!". Hopefully for you, it goes visa versa

 

3 months ago i checked a local honda dealer and asked if they did warranty work etc. They said "We don't do unpaid work on Acuras."

Might want to call down there first to make sure. I didn't look at the procedure but maybe this is something you can do yourself?

If not taken care of i imagine it would lead to mold, rusting of anything metal, possible grounding issues/shorts.

 

Honda will generally not do warranty work on Acuras. At least that was my experience.

I have a Honda dealer a mile away from my house and I still have to drive 10 miles to Acura to get my issues addressed.

 

I removed my rear seats to dry the water and see where it's leaking from. You can tell it's leaking from where that service bulletin points out. I took it down to the Honda dealer, showed them the service bulletin and where it was leaking from and they said it would take half an hour, costing $40. According to them, Honda does not cover service bulletins for free but Acura does... whatever. I'm just going to buy some silicon sealant and take care of it tomorrow.

Good news is they said they'll do the 105k service for only $780 (timing belt, water pump, serpentine belt, valve adjustment, etc.). Much cheaper than the $1,500+ I was quoted when I lived up in Seattle.

 

That grommet the service bulletin mentions is fine on my car. The tape around the grommet/wire loom is still perfectly in tact and I have no clue how water is leaking through it. I just put a ton of silicon sealer inside the car around the wires where it comes through the car under the rear seats. Hopefully that will stop the leak but I'm confused how it's getting in..

 

if its not the grommet it could be a pinched drain hose from the ceiling.

 

Well the water is under the seat. How I found out about it was one of my friends was sitting back there and said his ass was all wet. Yes, I asked if he shit himself or something but assured me there was water under my seat.

I pulled out the rear seats and sure enough, there's a puddle of water. I dried it out and the next day I checked it again. You can see where it was coming from (up through the wires running through the grommet). That little grommet was filled with all kinds of dirt/mud. Anyway, I filled both sides completely with black silicon sealer so hopefully this stops the leak. *fingers crossed*

 

Took a road trip this weekend to find out the problem is not fixed.

Anyone have a picture of exactly where this water is leaking into the car from?

 

Since we are exploring other possibilities, maybe check the drain tube. Granted that it is a long-shot, but it might be worth a try. The tube does run along an area that would allow water to run along the outside of the tube, then where the water could drip off of the tube and run down to the bottom of the seat. Long-shot, but

Water leak from roof in 2008 TL (click here)

 

Is this for certain or is it up to the dealer? I'm thinking about just biting the bullet and driving to an Acura dealer (two and a half hour trip though).

All of the water is pooled up under the seat and it's completely dry everywhere else, but I have no idea how it's getting in. I'll check the drain tube but I'm thinking it's a long-shot, especially since it's dry everywhere else.

 

The green circle is where I'm assuming this grommet is. As you can see, I filled the damn thing with silicon sealer but I'm guessing it's leaking on the edges? I just don't see how, because the grommet is in there fairly tight and the other seat is fine. I'm going to put the car on the lift tomorrow and check it out again. Last time I did, the grommet from the bottom was completely sealed. This problem is pretty frustrating as the rear cushion is pretty jacked up now.

 

As I recall, the problem was not with the grommet. It was more of a wicking effect where those wires would actually pull the water into the car. Call the Honda dealer first to see if they are willing to address it. If not, contact the Acura dealer, who may be able to offer a loaner vehicle while performing the work. I'm taking my car in for warranty work (wheel bearing) and asking them to perform the rear shelf rattle TSB procedures. I will be getting a loaner while it is there. Of course, my dealer is only 40 mins away and on the way into work, so it is slightly more convenient for me.

 

The picture is in the service news article, page 4. The leak comes from underneath the car, where sheath surrounding the wheel sensor harness contacts the grommet. There is a "wicking" effect drawing water into the car. The fix is to inject silicon into the wheel sensor harness, not the grommet.

 

The problem is that wheel sensor harness grommet was completely intact (no gap between the wire loom and rubber grommet, like depicted in that service bulletin), so I'm not sure how water is getting in or how I could apply any silicon sealer there.

I'm gonna put the car on a lift tomorrow and check it out again. The Honda dealer here won't do any work on my car unless I'm paying and the nearest Acura dealer is about two and a half hours away. I'm also out of warranty (93,000 miles).

 

Remember, warranty has nothing to do with them fixing this---it is a TSB and should be completed free of charge.

 

Well, to clarify, it's not a TSB. It's an article in the service news letter. Even TSBs are covered only under warranty. The District Manager can authorize a TSB to be performed under "goodwill" for out of warranty cars (read a TSB and you'll see this clause). The service news article seems like it's a done deal for the dealer to fix if a car has that problem, but again, it's not a TSB.

I do not have an Acura dealer near me, but there is a Honda dealer in town. I called the dealer that I bought my TL from and they agreed to let the Honda dealer perform various TSBs on my car (the local Honda dealer had to agree as well). I had to pay the Honda dealer up front for the labor charges and then I sent copies of the bills to my Acura dealer who in turn paid me. Any required parts were shipped from my Acura dealer to the Honda dealer. It works out fine, the only issue is that I have to front the labor fees. This may not work everywhere: both dealer have to agree to the arrangement.

 

I checked it out today and I'm still a bit confused. There was no gap as indicated in that bulletin unless I cut the electrical tape off around the grommet and the wires/wire loom. Once I did that, I pulled on the wires/wire loom a bit to see if I could find where the wire loom ended, but it doesn't. The wire loom goes all the way through the grommet and under the seat... so I'm not sure what that bulletin is depicting -- either it's showing the wire loom around the exposed wires or tape around the wire loom (if that makes sense).

I just put as much silicon sealant between the grommet and the wire loom, but now that I think of it I feel like I should have cut the wire loom and put silicon sealant inside of the wire loom.

If anyone has done this successfully, any tips would be appreciated. It sucks I can't really test it until it rains like crazy and go on a long drive with someone sitting in the rear seat...

 

Okay, I am resurrecting this thread because I have been plagued by this problem for about 5 years and didn't realize it until now. I wish I had seen this much sooner when I was still under warranty and before so much corrosion had occurred. Anyway, here's my story. Since I purchased my car 5 years ago, I have noticed a salty looking residue that kept appearing at the bottom of the seat belt in the rear seat. This is the seat belt near the middle of the seat for the middle passenger. Kind of a strange white crusty residue. The residue was there when I purchased my car and as part of the deal I had the Toyota dealer where I purchased the car, clean and detail that area, which they did and it looked just fine. Over the years every so often I would notice the crusty white residue reappearing and I thought it was odd, but I would just wipe it down with some soapy water and carry on. Being the second owner, I just assumed the previous owner had spilled something strange into the crevice or something like that. This wasn't too big a deal because I would have to clean it up maybe once a year. This was a very slow forming sort of thing.

Fast forward 5 years to last month and I was reaching into the back seat to get my son out and put my knee on the seat and my knee got all wet. The seat was soaked. Started searching Acurazine and found this thread. It appears my leak was is no longer a slow leak, but that it had gotten much worse. I pulled the back seat up and when driving around in the rain I noticed that quite a bit of water comes in.

I won't bore you with the details but I spoke to 2 dealers and to Acura Client Services and go nowhere due to the age and mileage on my car, so I decided to tackle this myself.

Here is what I did and some photos to help anyone else who might need to do this. What I found was slightly different that what is posted in the service bulletin a few posts above.

After removing the back seat, here is what I found. I drove around like this for a couple weeks and the water definitely comes in from the red circled area.

All that rust and corrosion is what really pisses me off about this whole thing, but fortunately it appears to be just surface rust. It does not rust through to the bottom of the vehicle as you'll see in the next photo.

This is a view of the grommet from the underside of the vehicle directly below the circled area from the first photo:


There did not seem to be any gaps at all in that area unlike what the service bulletin said. I was about to just put a bunch of silicon there, but I really didn't see how so much water could be coming in when I could see or feel any gaps at all. So instead I followed the cable down the line feeling for any gaps. Here is the view down the cable:


At the other end of the cable is where there was a pretty good sided gap, roughly 1/4 of a centimeter wide. It's hard to see from the photo because it is a bad angle, but between the orange connector and the black cabling sheath, there is a gap. Trust me:


I attempted to apply some silicon from under the car, but had a really hard time getting my hands in there and decided it would be easier if I pulled off the wheel and came in from the other side:


I applied a bunch of silicon around the area of the gap where the circled area is in this photo:


Now to wait and see if this stops my water leak...

... and then it will be onto the next task of getting rid of that rust. Any suggestions on that? I was thinking of just sanding it down and spraying the area with Rustoleum or something like that, but I'm open to other ideas.

 

Not sure why they wouldn't they are one in the same. Acura parts have Honda logos all over them.

 

I'm having the same problem, white substance on the belts. Curious if this remedy fixed your problem? Thanks

 

For me it did. Gone for over a year. Not a drop comes in any more.

 

JHumbo, did you seal the grommet or the connector. From the pictures I can't tell if he just coated the connector with silicon or if there was more thought to it.

 

I sealed both, but the grommet looked fine so it was probably unnecessary. Just coated it with some black automotive silicon stuff. My problem was definitely at the connector side.

And from the date on my post above, looks like I did this almost 2 years ago. Wow, time flies.

 

Awesome; now I've got a weekend project cause the dealerships and Acura customer service say they've never heard of this before. Looks simple enough and I need to swap out e-brake shoes as well. Did you swap out the seat belts or just clean them really well?

 

I looked into swapping out the seat belt, but that was not going to be easy and seemed rather costly, so I just cleaned them up as best I could. Sprayed them with mildew remover and them washed them with laundry detergent. Came out okay, but still a little stained.

 

you don't want to sand it because that is the metal that has oxidized.

Just get some rust black spray paint and paint over it.

 

I scraped the loose stuff with a metal wire brush and then used this stuff:


Seemed to work well. After nearly two years, there was no new rust or anything like that.

 

Wow, good catch. Many people would have moved on looking for a different source. I may check mine out, there was a little moisture a long time ago in that area. It reminds me years ago my car was frying ECUs a few times a year and I was finding coolant in the ECU. I couldn't find a coolant leak around the heater core and I even left the ECU sitting on the floor board and it still got coolant in it. I finally found that it was coming from a coolant sensor with an internal leak and thanks to a good weather seal at the connector, it was traveling through the wire's insulation and making it to the ECU definitely one of the weirdest things I've seen.

Back to the TL, I might go ahead and check it out but with an inch of rain a year it's going to be hard to tell if I even have a problem.

 

Nice to know. This happened to my mother's es350 and it was the biggest mystery!

 

With only an inch of rain, you'd probably never notice the problem. When I discovered this I drove around without a rear bench for a while and driving around during light rain hardly any water would come in. It would maybe end up a little moist around the grommet and that's about it. Only when driving during heavier rain would I see the water puddling up around that grommet.

 

I first noticed this om mine when I was on a road trip and had a friend in the back seat, it was raining and when he got out his ass was soaked. I got pissed at him cause I though he spilled something but then I figured out it was this. I had my seat out yesterday and again it was fucking soaked... I siliconed the grommet, but now that Ive seen this thread I will do it at the bottom of the harness as well because Im pretty sure water is somehow magically flowing UP through the wire harness. Acura makes some dumb ass mistakes and rarely takes responsibility for them and its pissing me off... Heres some pics just for the hell of it