Culprit of the Rain Water Leak? Volvo P1800

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I thought it was the windscreen rubber.

I thought it was the wiper holes.

I sealed both with windshield glue, causing the windscreen and paint look bad with residual leftover.

It rained really heavy recently. So heavy that my car got wet quite badly inside on the driver’s carpet. Reached home, I tried wipe clean the water in the carpet area. I look up from the gas pedal, trying to identify where the water flow from.

Then I saw some light from a hole. Oh! There is a hole inside there that penetrate to the outside of the car! Where is it? I saw a screw coming down from the hole.

It was the air vent grill on the car!

Original car has the air vent connected to a heater, which is useless for our weather. Previous owner has removed the heater set, and sealed the air vent with solid metal plate. To mount the aluminum grill onto the car, he drilled 3 holes and welded 5 screws to secure it to the metal plate. The screws were tighten with nuts.

I remembered seeing one nut fall off from the car long time ago, not knowing where it came from. Now it makes sense that the nut must be from one of the screw from the grill.

Not easy to tighten the nut back to the screw of the grill, so I asked my local mechanic for help. He did a good job by NOT just screwing the nut back, but removed all the 4 other nuts, took out the grill, resealed the holes with sealant, then only tighten all 5 nuts back. This ensured that there won’t be further leakage from the holes. Great job! He charged only RM35 for the job.

To tighten the nuts, it has to be accessed from the air vent hole that I sealed using a masking tape. Previous owner left it opened, and HOT air enters the car through the vent hole and I can feel heat on my legs. I wanted to fabricate aluminum cover to close the hole nicely, it will be the next project.

I am more confidently driving the car out during rainy day now.