Del SOl leaks bad

Help, my 94 Del Sol is filling up with water. The car is always garaged, but we drove in a bad storm, and I can hear water sloshing in the trunk area. I removed all the trunk interior and the interior plastic looking for the water and I think the water is in the rear window track area. Are there any drain holes that could be plugged up?

Try making sure the trunk area is clean around the outside of the trunk weather-stripping where the outside of the trunk lid covers. The water drains from the car and follows the trunk lines which drains out by your tail lights. If you spray the trunk with water, you'll see what I mean and where the water path goes.

If it's not dirty, then I'm at a loss as I don't think there's any drainage hoses - just a path where the water flows toward the rear of the car. I used silicone grease on the weatherstripping there though to help form a better seal and I keep the drainage areas clean that go around the stripping. Maybe you could try it as well?

Also, try checking the tail light gaskets too since the water path drains right over the lights. It could be leaking there too.

hey where can u buy silicon grease at ...ive been to kragen but they dont have it....

I have checked this area. The water is not in the trunk, but in the channel where the rear glass slides into. My trunk is nice and dry. The top has just started to leak right over the rear speakers. Is Honda the only place that sells the weather stripping? My wife loves this car, its all original with only 50k miles on it, so she wants to keep it a few more years.

It's possible that the waterway is gunked up. Not sure if it uses drain pipes though. When I wash mine, the water always runs off the rear window and follows the trunk lines and come out the tail lights. That's the drainage path. If you look at the weather stripping on either side of the rear glass on the outside, you'll see two small holes where water can run off. If it's getting stopped up anywhere, I'd say either there somewhere or just clean around the trunk's weather stripping on the outside.

Not saying your trunk's leaking (I thought you meant it though with the "water in the trunk area" bit in your post), but the water path flows around the trunk's weather stripping and if it's dirty, it won't drain correctly. If I can get the time, I'll snap a pic of how I see the water drain.

As for the leaking roof - all Del Sol's do it if not properly maintained. Honda's the only place I know that sells the weather stripping and it's not cheap. Try lubing the seals with silicone grease. Mine would leak a bit in the front where the glass meets the front of the roof, but when I clean and lube the seals, it stops. Most of the time, it's all you need. Honda also has a kit to repair leaky roof's. The '93 and '94 models have the most problems with leaky roofs. Honda re-designed the seals starting in '95. I also use silicone spray from Honda. I use it where the seals touch the windows since it won't smear when dry.

Maintain the targa top (http://www.teamdelsol.com/technical/howto/targaMaintenance/default.asp)

darksol1030 -
Honda sells the silicone grease - shouldn't be more than a few bucks. Maybe like $5 or so. You can buy the silicone spray there as well for about the same price.

There are drainage tubes.

The sit one on each side underneath the sail panels slightly in front of the rear struts. If you pull the trim out you can reach around and feel them. They empty any excess water into the wheel well as far as I know.

I took my sailpanels off and replaced the clips like on the "How to" tahts on the net to stop the trunk leaking.

I blew out these tubes at the same time as they were both blocked up. Took about 50psi though :P

Havnt had any trouble with leaks since

Good info to know. Thanks for giving us the heads up. :thumbsup:

Sail panels?, drain tubes?. Even the Honda Tech couldnt tell me that. I will try and remove the sail panels, and find the drain tubes.

Thanks for all the help. I will post up my results.

Well, I cant seem to find any instruction on how to remove the sail panels, does somebody have a link to this. I did find the info about the new "clips" and also found directions on shimming the targa top to help with a leak.

Here's scans from my '95 service manual.

http://myspeedworks.com/~otaku/automotiveforums/reartrim.jpg

http://myspeedworks.com/~otaku/automotiveforums/draintubes.jpg

Here's scans from my '95 service manual.

http://myspeedworks.com/~otaku/automotiveforums/reartrim.jpg

http://myspeedworks.com/~otaku/automotiveforums/draintubes.jpg

w00t for honda service manual. the best thing i ever bought for my del sol and my wallet :) :) :)

Hope you got the scans. My ISP decided to finally cut the service I cancelled over a week ago so I lost them. If you still need the scans, I'll re-scan them and post them again. I think they were deleted from my PC as well - I was cleaning up some stuff and probably axed them.

I did get the scans. I cleaned out the drain holes under the sail panels. The right drain took 45psi to clear the line. Lots of "mud" in the drain. I also shimmed the targa top latches. Have not tested the seals yet. And as far as the water in the window track, I used my MightyVac tool, with a long hose, slid it down the rear window track, and removed just over 1 liter of water. The "sloshing" was driving me nuts, but it should be fixed now.

Thanks to all that helped me on this problem. This site is great!!

Glad you got it taken care of. You should zip on over to Team Del Sol's forum sometime and say hi. You think this place has a lot of Del Sol info? The people over at the Team Sol forum probably know more about Del Sol's than Honda does. :)

While the Automotive Tech guys can be pretty cool, and they're HELLA knowledgeable, they can also be asshats... just a warning to a potential newbie.

Asshats... that's just damn funny. But yes, they can be.

go to superhonda.com or honda-acura.net no ass holes there and very knowlegeable

SuperHonda? That's funny...so I've heard, AT got started cuz they got fed up w/ the assholes over there... LOL and then AT turned into the asshat forum it now is :)
Unless you speak of a different SuperHonda.

Honda-Acura.net is a good one. So's HondaHookUp.com and SolSociety.com, just watch out for Doc at SS, he can be a little harsh at times. HondaSociety.com and Honda-Forum.com would be good if they had more members...