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2013 Leaking Sunroof gasket or clogged sunroof drains ?

Discussion in 'Gen 3 Prius Care, Maintenance & Troubleshooting' started by Markee, Jun 25, 2022.

  1. Markee

    Markee Member

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    Leaking water running down inside the headliner passenger side where the sun visor attaches
    See below video link

    Does this leak look like its coming from the sunroof seals or a plugged sunroof drain ?

    https://photos.app.goo.gl/RR6AfB4Wy4Q9c4Wz7
     

    Attached Files:

    MarknHev likes this.
  2. ca3799

    ca3799 Junior Member

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    I came here looking for this exact same problem. Did you find a solution?
     
  3. Markee

    Markee Member

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  4. ca3799

    ca3799 Junior Member

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    Thanks- I'll take a look!
     
  5. ca3799

    ca3799 Junior Member

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    So I looked at that thread and did not see the problem you and I are having with the water dripping from the visor mounting bracket. Their leaks are along the edge of the sunroof. Ours is not.

    My sun visor bracket dripped a fair amount of water on me in the automatic car wash yesterday- enough to leave a palm-sized spot of water on my pant leg. I've had the car for about 10 years and this has never happened before. I have used this automatic car wash many times before. I checked the sun visor mounting bracket on the passenger side of the car and it had 1 drop of water on it; not enough to leak on someone but just enough to let me know it did indeed leak also.

    I spent a lot of the day working on the problem but didn't find a solution.

    I took the car to the shop that replaced the windshield several years ago. He said it was not the windshield leaking but the sunroof. He said he was able to recreate the leak using a hose but I did not see him perform this test so don't know how much pressure he applied to the area.

    I did find that my 2102 Prius with sunroof (and solar panel) does not have a traditional drain that runs down the frame of the car from the well of sunroof using a tube and that drips behind the wheel well as most other cars seem to have described.

    It does have a very short drain that drains directly onto the windshield though. You can see this on the outside of the car as a small gap in the black gasket between the windshield and the car, about two inches in from each side.

    You can see this on the inside of the car if you open the sunroof and pour a small amount of water in the sunroof well. You will see the water travel from inside the well, through a small square-to-rectangular shaped hole near the left and right front corners of the well, and down onto the windshield from the gap in that gasket. (I've often wondered what that gap was for.) I have a bamboo skewer placed in this spot in the image linked below because it is both hard to see and to photograph.

    AND, interestingly, if you close the sunroof and pour water in the same area- at the corner where the sunroof and car meet near the windshield- water will leak into the well and drain out onto the windshield also.

    The sunroof gasket that you see on the outside/top of the car that is along the edges of the sunroof is not waterproof. The waterproof gaskets are inside the sunroof well and are on parts of the car that are higher than the bottom of the sunroof well.

    The strange part of all this is that the visor mounting bracket isn't really in this area. It's slightly uphill of this corner/drain area.
    So how did the water get to the visor mounting bracket? Did it run uphill when the wind blew on the windshield? Did it run downhill from the back part of the sunroof?

    I took the driver-side sun visor and its mounting bracket off. I saw that one of the clips holding the sun visor in was a little rusty and that there was rust staining inside of the decorative cover of the mounting bracket. Nothing else in this area appeared to have gotten wet. I did not see any place where water could have come from when looking into the small space inside the visor bracket gap.

    I was unable to recreate the leak with the small amounts of water I poured onto the car.
     
    #5 ca3799, Aug 10, 2023
    Last edited: Aug 10, 2023
  6. ca3799

    ca3799 Junior Member

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  7. MkPat

    MkPat New Member

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    I'm having the exact same problem. When I go through a carwash the water will come into the vehicle through the sun visor. Did you find the problem with yours?