Sunroof leaking ?

[Mustard]

Is it normal to hear a bit of sloshing overhead after some overnight heavy rain when driving off first thing ?

I cant find any signs of water ingress on anything in and around the sunroof, seats, inside of windows or the boot. I definitely heard a sloshing sound of water above my head moving towards the back of the car when driving off to work this morning.

Does this sound like my sunroof is leaking and needs attention or could this just be normal drainage behaviour ?

 

[Saeed J Ghnaim]

I suggest to check the drainage around the sun roof .. there are two located on the front of the sunroof draining from the passenger and driver door sides ( right next to the door hinge) and two located on the back on the sunroof draining towards the back wheels. also look for water marks around the sunroof rails and so..

 

[Mustard]

Thanks I will have a look at those today and make sure they are clear.

Stupid question time.... If a sunroof is open when weather is good and closed when weather is bad then why would you have drainage holes ? How is the water getting past the sunroof when its closed to be needed to be drained ?

 

[Zafi]

The sunroof part which is visible from the outside is not a watertight seal against the rest of the roof. Any water passing through the tiny gap goes into the main frame of the sunroof, this has drains which run down pipes to let the water escape without it spilling into the passenger compartment. These drains can block with dust, broken down leaves etc and need cleaning out if they get blocked.

 

[Mustard]

Ok thanks for your explanation, I've just had some work done to the sunroof to make it work again so the entire lot including headlining etc has been stripped out, new parts fitted etc and then all re fitted. I think they have done a good job I just got worried when I heard all that water about a week after the works were completed and have become paranoid

 

[Saeed J Ghnaim]

Glad the car got fixed... did they find any water when they pulled it apart? did you find our where was that water noise coming from?

 

[rum4mo]

I think that you are correct to be worried just in case any of the hidden work is not "good", I suppose that you could spray water on to the roof area and see if it flows out of all the four drain pipes.

 

[Mustard]

I've only had the car a few months and the sunroof never worked when I bought it. I never noticed any water noises since I've owned it but the motor had broken a long time ago so I'm guessing it has been shut tight for a while. There were some clips that had snapped and jammed the motor until it burned itself out (I was told it was something like that) so I had it all fixed up recently, entire system was removed, problematic parts replaced and now its all good, works like a dream, you'd never know its been done. My only gripe was that driving with it open on tilt was it was making an irritating squeaking sound that I couldn't put up with. I guessed this would be some debris both on the rim of the sunroof seal and the inner edge of the sunroof bodywork causing the noise so I wiped it all clean and then applied a small amount of silicon spray to both edges to take care of any friction related issues. That night it rained overnight and when I got in it and drove off first thing, I heard a whoosh as the sound of water went over the top of my head but I never saw it run off down the rear windows or anything so that's why I started this thread. I'm thinking Ive made an easy path for the water to go through into the part that's designed to catch this water and then its drained off as it should as the car has moved forward as I cant see any signs of water in the car and there no problems that have presented themselves .....

 

[Saeed J Ghnaim]

I've only had the car a few months and the sunroof never worked when I bought it. I never noticed any water noises since I've owned it but the motor had broken a long time ago so I'm guessing it has been shut tight for a while. There were some clips that had snapped and jammed the motor until it burned itself out (I was told it was something like that) so I had it all fixed up recently, entire system was removed, problematic parts replaced and now its all good, works like a dream, you'd never know its been done. My only gripe was that driving with it open on tilt was it was making an irritating squeaking sound that I couldn't put up with. I guessed this would be some debris both on the rim of the sunroof seal and the inner edge of the sunroof bodywork causing the noise so I wiped it all clean and then applied a small amount of silicon spray to both edges to take care of any friction related issues. That night it rained overnight and when I got in it and drove off first thing, I heard a whoosh as the sound of water went over the top of my head but I never saw it run off down the rear windows or anything so that's why I started this thread. I'm thinking Ive made an easy path for the water to go through into the part that's designed to catch this water and then its drained off as it should as the car has moved forward as I cant see any signs of water in the car and there no problems that have presented themselves .....

All sounds good. Hopefully you won't have any issues with it. Just to be on the safe side.. next time you wash the car or it rains heavily, keep an eye (or ear lol) on it.. if this doesn't happen again I wouldn't worry much about it. The thing is people sometimes do not understand how to maintain a car (like the previous owner of my previous car).. they think looking after a car is just about oil/filter change, brakes..etc. They don't understand that you need to maintain and look after the sunroof, paint, interior leather and soo many other things. In a parallel universe were cars rule the world, us humans will be punished severely lol

 

[Mustard]

In a parallel universe were cars rule the world, us humans will be punished severely lol

I did try looking for the drain holes and thought I found them but am a little unsure if they are. If I stand at the drivers side of the car with the sunroof fully open I can see a small round hole just under the roof gubbins (there's 1 on my side too but I cant see it unless I go round to passenger side etc). I'm assuming these are the drain holes but they appear to come out just above the door in a silver trim, I cant see any holes by the hinges and I cant see the rear holes at all. Am I looking in the right places ?

 

[Saeed J Ghnaim]

I did try looking for the drain holes and thought I found them but am a little unsure if they are. If I stand at the drivers side of the car with the sunroof fully open I can see a small round hole just under the roof gubbins (there's 1 on my side too but I cant see it unless I go round to passenger side etc). I'm assuming these are the drain holes but they appear to come out just above the door in a silver trim, I cant see any holes by the hinges and I cant see the rear holes at all. Am I looking in the right places ?

I guess you are looking at the right place... ill take some pics tomorrow and post them just to be sure.

 

[Mustard]

OK thanks, I will do the same

 

[rum4mo]

From memory, no sunroof now, you should be able to see the front two drains in the sunroof tray, but the rear ones are too far back to see. The ends of the front drains used to come out near the front door hinges - in the door closure, the rears appear at each side behind the rear wheels maybe, they should all terminate with a soft self sealing/closing "nipple"!

 

[Mustard]

I have a hole directly opposite this as well.


I'm assuming these are the drain outs


I thought these were something as well

 

[rum4mo]

Where exactly is that third picture of?

 

[Mustard]

Where exactly is that third picture of?

Third picture is where the side of the roof meets the top of the door frame (both front) so the door shuts and this would be directly on the top of the door

 

[rum4mo]

Third picture is where the side of the roof meets the top of the door frame (both front) so the door shuts and this would be directly on the top of the door

Oh, now you have forced me to go and have a look at my early 2011 S4 without sunroof, I had never noticed that ribbed area before, and no, that must be for a roofrack fitting.(these are on my car as well)
So, your first position below the front door electrics conduit is correct, that is the front drains discharge point, maybe gently poke something into that self sealing opening once or twice a year to stop it sealing shut, I'm saying that as a Skoda Superb owner had his car getting flooded as these discharge points, probably older version that your's had sealed shut - just don't be too rough with them though.

So, I'd reckon that you need to still locate the rear drain discharge points, unless silly Audi have done what it seems VW did with the Polo and reduce the discharges to front only, I hope not, maybe check inside the side areas of the boot inside the amplifier aperture if you have one, and from my experience of my old 2000MY Passat, there should be a pipe running down the line of the rear of the rear wheel arch - if so it will appear below there somewhere on the outside.

 

[Mustard]

You have an S4 ? Lovely, 3.0 V6 supercharged ? I wanted to get an S4 except my previous motor drained every last drop of anything I had that resembled currency out of me so I ended up having to settle for for this instead.

With regards to the sunroof, what are the drains draining from ? Is there some sort of lip that runs around the inner frame that catches water or something ?

 

[Saeed J Ghnaim]

It's really hard to tell from your pics... but the drains out you have are correct.. however check out my pics of the holes in the front of the sunroof tray. I have checked my car as well.. it seems the back holes are too far in to see.. weirdly I thought I saw them before (must be in another car). however try to gently pour water down the drains and the back side of the sunroof and trace out the water out of the drains. (possibly you'll be able to see the back drain location.)

 

[rum4mo]

You have an S4 ? Lovely, 3.0 V6 supercharged ? I wanted to get an S4 except my previous motor drained every last drop of anything I had that resembled currency out of me so I ended up having to settle for for this instead.

With regards to the sunroof, what are the drains draining from ? Is there some sort of lip that runs around the inner frame that catches water or something ?

Yes, I bought a 2 year old S4 as a replacement for my 13 year old, owned from new VW Passat 2.8V6 4Motion - which was just VW using up old Audi A4 B5 designs and bits, that Passat has just passed its MOT at its 16th birthday as I know the guy I sold it to, as usual very little needed doing to prepare it to sail thro the MOT.

These sunroofs have a "tray with sides" below the moving roof part, so that captures any water that gets past the seal round the moving roof.

Again, I'll repeat also for the benefit of the previous poster, these holes above the doors must be for fitting a roof rack so will be blind holes and have nothing to do with draining the sunroof water.

Edit:- there will be only four drain outlets low down on the car, the front two you know about, the rear two are the ones you need to find and confirm that they are open to allow the water to discharge, as I said, look behind the side panels in the boot the pipes should run down the rear of the rear wheel arches.

 

[Mustard]

I will have a look for those pipes in the rear later on and I have now located the front 2 drains





I can see from the dusty plastic stuff that this is the route the water takes so I will have a little test over carefully pouring water into the front drains to see if it comes out the other end.

As for pouring water into it to check the rear drains, I don't know if I want to try that as I cant see where to pour it.

 

[rum4mo]

I would suggest, with the car nose down a bit, pour some water down the front drains, by doing that you will get to know how much water it is safe pour into the edge of the tray. Then with the car tail down a bit pour water into the edge of the tray - on both sides at the rate that worked for both sides at the front.

 

[Mustard]

I havnt managed to do that yet but we have had quite a bit of rain and it only seems to be when its rained overnight that it manages to get through into the area where it needs to drain off. When I pull away I usually pull away to the right and I can hear the water go backwards towards passenger c pillar. I havn't found the rear drains but I'm not experiencing any water in the car itself. Headlining is dry, not stains or anything, no drips or drops anywhere, no streaks down inside of rear windscreen etc so I think its doing its job.

I have however been getting annoyed by the clattering of the headlining rattling, took me a while to figure it out as its intermittent but it comes from where the headlining has the whole in it for the sun roof etc. It has a bit of play in it and I think it should be secured against the rim somehow but all I can find are 2 blind holes on either side of the tray. I have attached some pics, do you guys have any idea of what maybe missing from this ? For now I'm using some sticky foam pads to stop it clattering (which works) but I'm looking for a permanent solution.