Important water ingress check to make on your T6!

[Lucasimo]

Hi everyone,

Just in the middle of insulating my T6 van and noticed a cup size amount puddle of water in the inside of the rear quarter panel cavity on the passenger side. The arrow on one of the photos shows where it is when you are inside the van and where it is on the outside of the van.

The cause of the water ingress is the rear quarter panel pressure vents. The perimeter seal on the pressure vents is not good enough and rain water seeps behind it. When the water gets into this space it sits there for a long time and if not dealt with, it will cause serious corrosion damage.

I have seen this when I did a T5 up a few years ago. One side had lost a lot of metal and had to be welded.

Removing the pressure vents is difficult. They fit in the space with clips and are easy to put in but annoyingly hard to remove. Mine were already falling apart (plastic was very brittle) and this is a 2017 van. In the end, I had to contend with them breaking apart as I got them off.

A thumb size area of rust was developing on the driver's side cavity so to be sure on this I cleaned it up and sprayed Dinitrol 3125 cavity wax inside the cavity as you can see in the photo. Make sure you get to all the internal edges. You could use Waxoyl or similar. I just prefer Dinitrol as it works very well to slow down the corrosion rate.

When the new pressure vents arrive I will fix them to the bodywork using Soudal Fix All on the rubber seals. This will stop rain water getting behind the seal.

If only VW used a better rubber seal it would be much better!

I will see if my local VW dealer can get them in for me quickly.

The VW part number is 7E0819181 and this part is also fitted on the T5 and other VW vehicles.

It's actually a good idea to remove the bumper every few years to remove accumulated mess that ends up there.

Removing the rear bumper is not too tricky. Take your time and go steady with the plastic. I cut my hand up quite badly so make sure you wear some decent gloves!

 

[manfrotto]

I though VW provided a 10 year rust warranty?

 

[Lucasimo]

So they do but it's often not covering these things. They also don't cover zinc reaction corrosion damage which I have spotted on one location on the sliding door.

Also another location to watch out for is the plastic blanking panel that sits behind the sliding door cover panel. After around 8-10 years the seal on this can fail and then this lets rainwater in. Failure to fix this can lead to this section getting quite bad corrosion damage.

You often only spot these things after doing a restoration project. I didn't finish my T5 I had, but I certainly learned a lot and it went to a good home for finishing off into a nice van

 

[Vinyl1210]

Useful info. Are these the same on the T6.1??

 

[Lucasimo]

Useful info. Are these the same on the T6.1??

Im absolutely sure the build is the same on the 6.1. Interestingly the large plastic blanking plate behind the sliding door rail is not actually fitted on my T6 van. I had two of these things on my T5 which had two sliding doors. It's a palm sized cover panel for the motorized door opening option so perhaps not all vans have this cover. If you do have this palm size cover panel make absolutely sure you keep a good eye on it since the seal will fail at some point and then it will rot the metal fast since rainwater is very aggressive to metal. Just fix it in with polyurethane sealant unless you actually want a motorized door opener (I wouldn't bother - another electrical thing to go wrong)

 

[T6Norfolk]

Interesting mines a 2016 and I have spotted a patch of rust starting to form on the rear passenger quarter. Better investigate before I finish sound deadening ect

 

[Lucasimo]

Interesting mines a 2016 and I have spotted a patch of rust starting to form on the rear passenger quarter. Better investigate before I finish sound deadening ect

Yeah. Definitely sort this before finishing the sound deadening work. It's a frequently overlooked location as it's hidden by the bumper. Many people dont realise the vents exist.

 

[Vinyl1210]

Do you ‘have’ to take the rear bumper off to simply view the offending area from underneath or can you simply crawl under the rear. Appreciate you probably gave to remove it to seal up and perhaps replace the vents.

Edit to say was thinking of blagging my mates drive on MOT ramp or 4 post lift over the weekend to have a quick gander.

 

[Lucasimo]

Do you ‘have’ to take the rear bumper off to simply view the offending area from underneath or can you simply crawl under the rear. Appreciate you probably gave to remove it to seal up and perhaps replace the vents.

Edit to say was thinking of blagging my mates drive on MOT ramp or 4 post lift over the weekend to have a quick gander.

You do have to take the bumper off to have a good look really, since it covers pretty much everything.

It is possible to remove the vents without breaking them but you have to be very careful. Perhaps using a wooden or plastic tool in-between where the seal contacts the bodywork will help here.

I was trying to do it in the dark with some LED lights with a badly bleeding hand. Not the best working conditions!

A leaking sliding door cover panel gasket seal and panel clips can also cause rainwater to end up in this location. In my case it was a bit of both.

 

[Vinyl1210]

Thanks for reply. Mines a '72 Plate (year'22) T6.1 and I've only done 11k miles at this juncture, so shouldn't have any issues at present but this is all worthwhile stuff to be aware of. I fitted (after about 6 months of ownership when I fitted the Navis wheels), some aftermarket mud flaps (sort of Rally style I suppose you would call them), and these totally cover the lower edge of the wheel arch liner, AND they protrude right into the wheel arch. I'm hoping these will minimise greatly any water ingress via this route. Can be seen here https://www.t6forum.com/attachments/img_1529-jpeg.273720/.
However, all that being said, I think I will make it a yearly check to whip off the inside panel on both sides and have a check for water ingress and perhaps feed up an endoscope camera from underneath to view the outside, then remove the bumper if I need to for a clean out or remedial actions. I plan to keep the van long term so worth the chore IMHO.
Once again thanks for this useful post!!

Edit to ask (perhaps a stupid) question. I specced my van with Electrical soft close and latching Tailgate and Sliding door. Would these vents still be fitted on mine as you can literally just lower the lid or push the slider really slowly/gently to within a few millimetres of home then let go and it'll gently (obviously) grab and latch. No force whatsoever required. Just a thought, and apologies if I'm a numpty!!

 

[Lucasimo]

Thanks for reply. Mines a '72 Plate (year'22) T6.1 and I've only done 11k miles at this juncture, so shouldn't have any issues at present but this is all worthwhile stuff to be aware of. I fitted (after about 6 months of ownership when I fitted the Navis wheels), some aftermarket mud flaps (sort of Rally style I suppose you would call them), and these totally cover the lower edge of the wheel arch liner, AND they protrude right into the wheel arch. I'm hoping these will minimise greatly any water ingress via this route. Can be seen here https://www.t6forum.com/attachments/img_1529-jpeg.273720/.
However, all that being said, I think I will make it a yearly check to whip off the inside panel on both sides and have a check for water ingress and perhaps feed up an endoscope camera from underneath to view the outside, then remove the bumper if I need to for a clean out or remedial actions. I plan to keep the van long term so worth the chore IMHO.
Once again thanks for this useful post!!

Edit to ask (perhaps a stupid) question. I specced my van with Electrical soft close and latching Tailgate and Sliding door. Would these vents still be fitted on mine as you can literally just lower the lid or push the slider really slowly/gently to within a few millimetres of home then let go and it'll gently (obviously) grab and latch. No force whatsoever required. Just a thought, and apologies if I'm a numpty!!

Interesting comment about the soft close thing. So I would expect the vents to be fitted in all cases since it's all about air pressure control. My thought is why would VW not fit the pressure vents on a van with soft close, since it would mean a completely different panel to be produced costing more money. That's my logical assumption anyway.

I guess at 11k miles you'll be fine for now. Maybe check it after 12 months. My advice is to buy a set of plastic AmTech trim removal tools from Euro Car Parts. They are essential for removing trim clips the correct way to avoid breaking things. They will help when you need to remove your bumper.