United232

Hi @ClimbingPaul, truthfully I don't know, so forgive me but this is just an opinion... The recommended sealer has a very low surface tension (around half that of the water we're fighting against), so if it can find a way into the crack it will get there ahead of the water. So it'll probably be OK just to treat the inner channel on the basis that capillary action will pull it where it's needed, but is 'probably' good enough? I suspect not. Remember it's the outer channel that carries all of the water away (that's the water that passes between the glass closure and the roof skin) - the inner channel remains largely dry. It's critical therefore that the repair extends to the outer channel, howsoever it's effected. I agree that access to the outer seam isn't great, but it's not impossible with a steady hand and a little patience, and my recommendation would be to ensure it's treated too. Do heed my caution that the area is thoroughly dry though. @moris, good call on the temporary fix! Let us know how it works out, but don't attempt it until you've had at least a week or two of warm, dry weather.

Hi All As the original poster, I've had quite a few people contact me over the last couple of years, enquiring as to the effectiveness of the repair. Happily I can confirm that after two years, ~16,000 miles and a couple of ... let's face it ... pretty testing winters, the vehicle remains 100% dry inside. Not even any condensation on the glass in the coldest of conditions. And that's what I'd expect, given the properties of the sealer used, and the way in which it was applied. There is one point I may have failed to make absolutely clear though, and it's likely to be where the odd one or two may have fallen down. And @moris, with respect I can see you're heading that way too. The sealer is a water-based material, and so it remains vulnerable until it's cured. If you apply it to a wet environment, or an environment which is irrigated, it will ... at the risk of stating the bleedin' obvious ... just get washed out. It is therefore imperative that the repair site is absolutely dry, and remains that way until the sealer has cured. I know that's going to prove a challenge if you can't get the vehicle indoors, dry the affected area properly* and keep it that way for the duration of the remediation process. It's an irony that these things come to light only in the conditions that are most adverse to effecting their repair. If you're really stuck with it though, you could consider taping up the roof gap (as many have said), and postponing the repair until the better weather is here. Just be careful that any tape you use comes off after a few months (unlike masking tape) and doesn't bring any paint or lacquer with it. Oh, and it's waterproof! * When it comes to drying the affected area, probably the worst way of doing this in these damp conditions is to used forced warm air - the warm air will merely absorb more and more moisture until it finds a cold object on which to condense. And that'll be the aluminium channel you're trying to seal. Good luck and better weather!

Hi @PanoYeti, @Goose35 Apologies, I've been away for a few days, but it looks as if you're both on top of it now. Yeah, the sealer is funny stuff. When I'd completed the final treatment, I left it to dry for a few days before testing it. Initially the water rinsed out quite a milky residue. Alarming perhaps, but now with the benefit of hindsight, it proved nothing to worry about. I did also pack some blue tissue paper behind the screen-pillar trim on both sides so I could pull it out after a week or two to check the integrity of the repair. Again, all was well. @PanoYeti, "I wish access was a bit better on the outside channel" - you and I both. You'll see now why I initially elected to remove the roof, but it wasn't necessary. Even though the needle pointed away from the joint at an obtuse angle, capillary action (the enemy in service) came to the rescue. Full marks to you BTW for doing this outside ... Per ardua ad astra, eh? You may consider a 'top-up' on a fine summer's day though as an insurance policy. But only when the lawns are mowed, the hedges trimmed and conditions favour this kind of nonsense. Happy days, eh?

Hi @PanoYeti "is it easy for leaking water to migrate to different parts of the cavity?" Yes, the evidence would certainly support that. "Was your former job a Skoda design tech?" I've been called some names over the years, but that one takes the biscuit.

Hi @Goose35 Apologies for the slow reply - I've just got back home, and as you may already have gathered, I don't get out much. Yes, absolutely. If you look at the image above I posted (on Tuesday 3rd at 19:49) you'll see the cable of which you speak entering the same cavity as the one from which the water is exiting. The 'spring' is a toughened steel cable with a spiral-wound outer strand which engages with a sprocket on the motor to drive the glass open and shut. The translucent outer cable finishes at the point where it meets this cavity, so any water which has entered this cavity is free to migrate into the outer cable. If you look along the sides of the roof, you should see that there's the opportunity to get into this cable with some WD40 or similar, to stop any water-induced deterioration. Good luck with your repair. If this article helps, tweet it, 'like' it, put it on BookFace. Whatever. Give me love. Best regards.

Hi @PanoYeti Yup, you're definitely ‘in the ball-park’. Don’t expect to keep feeding the stuff in until you see it dripping out of the egress point though. You’re only trying to seal a tiny gap in the ~30mm long interface between the two parts of the frame. Are you using a syringe & needle? If so, when you deliver a tiny, tiny drop at the join (just 2mm in front of your screwdriver), you should see it getting drawn into the crack. Here are the salient points from my document: The viscosity of the sealer is very low. It will run through the crack and out of the other side before you know it, so I applied six or eight separate treatments over the course of three or four days, allowing the sealer to cure properly and build up after each successive treatment. The instructions say ‘Apply sparingly’ - that’s the truth. It probably only required 0.5 – 1ml of sealer on each side of the roof. Not much when you consider the significance of it. I hope you got the joint properly dry after your testing? This is a water-based product, and I would want anything to compromise its curing ability... Oh, and don’t get too excited or you will mess your trousers. One way or another.

How to gain access to the two screws? From memory you'll pull out the panel surrounding the sunroof control knob*, then you can 'easily' remove the plate surrounding the two down-lights and the thing carrying the two alarm sensors. Once you've done that, you'll have to remove the hinged spectacle case/cover at the back. Ironically, though it tells you how to remove the latter in the driver's handbook (so you can manually shut the sunroof in the event of failure), it was the only thing that picked a fight with me. Once you've got all of that plastic out of the way, you will six T20(?) Torx® screws in three rows - two at the front, two in the middle and two at the back. Take them out, and the whole roof console-thing is in your hands. How did I plug the drain holes? I actually used a couple of ear-plugs I had left over from the last time my mother-in-law came to visit. * I trust you're using sharp picks, not screwdrivers? You don't want the job looking like it was done by a main dealer ...

Hi @PanoYeti I don't think the 'nose up, nose down' thing will make any difference. The front edge of the roof accounts for approximately 20% of its perimeter, so it's reasonable to assume that the same 20% of rainwater will pass the glass along the front edge. The design of the roof is such that (If the vehicle is nose-up) the water will head towards the back, rather than down the front drains. Half of that 20% will then flow past the point of ingress on each side of the roof. If it's nose-down ... well, you've got the other 80% heading over the point of ingress. Best regards.

Hi @PanoYeti Yup, I was there too ... I probably spent around eight hours analysing and conducting a series of tests to determine the probable cause. I'm not sure which side of the eight hours you are yet, but it does at least sound as if you've got the headlining out, as you refer to the rectangular hole? Have a look a the image below. Does it look familiar? It's a crop from the reduced sized image that constitutes Figure 5 in my document. Look closely and you'll see no fewer than 3 drips emanating from the rectangular hole. This is from the O/S. That's the side that I repaired in-situ, and the side that I described as leaking about as severely 'as if the roof had been left wide open'. Now you could go ahead and remove the drain tube, plug the stub and 'pond' the water as I did to establish with some conviction the point of ingress (if you haven't already done so), or you could take a leap-of-faith and invite Captain Tolley to the party. I'd suggest that you read my document again, and when you've read it, read it again. When writing it (and as always) I chose my words very carefully. Good luck, and once again keep us posted. Best regards

Hi @PanoYeti, thanks for your comment 'Drip Feed'? In essence, yes. I'd prefer to say though that I delivered a single drop of fluid directly to the point of ingress with surgical precision, and watched whilst capillary action drew it into the crack. I then repeated the process until no further fluid was drawn in, and repeated the cycle after each preceeding treatment had cured. But yeah, drip-feeding works for me too. Just make sure you get water out of the crack first (either with an air jet or by allowing it to dry out) or you'll compromise our Captain Tolley. Make sure you use a syring and needle as I did (you'll find what you need on Amazon if your local rehab. centre is getting low), and don't be surprised to find that the construction of the roof only allows you to point the needle away from the join, and not into it. The procedure I've described will just work anyway. I'm happy to report that ~3 months on, and having seen half a lifetime's rain, the car remains as dry as a biscuit inside. Good luck with your repair - keep us posted. Best regards ...

Hi @italian job Thanks very much for your comment. I feel your pain - what is ostensibly a trivial issue has rendered the car unusable, so let me try and answer your question. I originally tried to diagnose the problem by hosing the roof and windscreen of the car with a helper sitting in the front seat. The results were inconsistent. On occasions, drops of water were seen falling to the floor in the vicinity of the glove box (on mine, the problem was on the N/S). Other times no amount of hosing would make any water visible. Clearly you can’t fix the problem unless you can successfully diagnose its cause, so it was important to have a reliable, repeatable means of provoking the leak. Fundamentally (unless there are multiple underlying causes) this also gives you an initial point from which you can test the effectiveness of your repair. I describe how I isolated the cause in the Analysis and Testing section of the document I originally posted. Let’s call that method ‘Test 1’. Having effected the repair then, I conducted the following tests with the headlining, seats, carpet and underlay out of the car: I repeated 'Test 1' I set up a test-rig to irrigate the roof and windscreen of the car with a hose (avoiding irrigating the vehicle sides enabled me to see the run-off from the drain tubes) I left the vehicle out in what turned into a torrential downpour lasting a several hours I re-fitted the interior and put the car back into service leaving some blue absorbent paper behind the NSF screen pillar trim as a witness. I retrieved the paper after three weeks in service and, like the rest of the car it was bone dry. What I didn’t do was to use a pressure washer though. Were you referring to its use as a means just to ‘wash' the vehicle, or as a means to attempt some form of pressure test? If it’s the former, a pressure washer is essentially a high-pressure, low-volume device, so a hose pipe will deliver a greater volume of water in the same time, and is therefore more likely to provoke failure of an inadequate repair. If you meant as a pressure test, I wouldn’t advocate this because it wouldn’t effectively replicate a normal service condition. A fairer test may be to put it through a car wash though. If you’ll forgive my hubris, given the positive identification I made of the problem, the nature of its cause and the characteristics of the material I used for the repair, I would have more faith in mine now than that of a new vehicle. I would urge you to conduct ’Test 1’ after your repair, and before you proceed to any further testing, and I wish you well. Please post back with you findings. Best regards

@Ketchka I had a similar problem with my 2011 Elegance. I say 'similar' because it transpired that neither of the seat base elements was working, although both of the seat back elements were working. The impression however was that the heating function of both seats had failed. Can I suggest that you try leaving the heaters on with the seats cold and unoccupied, and the engine running (to ensure that you've got a good 12 - 14 volts in the bus). Feel the leather with your hand after 10 minutes, to see if there's a discernible temperature difference between the base and the back. If there is, I'd suspect that, like mine, both of the base elements are broken. In that case, post back again, and I can give you some first-hand advice if you feel like replacing the elements yourself. It doesn't require any special skills, but it is quite time-consuming (a couple of hours per seat), so you could save yourself quite a bit in labour. The elements themselves cost me around £80 all-in for the pair. If there is no discernible temperature difference following the above test, it is most likely that you have another problem, possibly with the controller, but I have no experience in this area, so I'm not going to offer "words of advice".

Folks Thanks for your comments. @silverfoxtsbb Figure 7 in the document I attached shows the stripped interior. The floor itself is essentially just a flat panel, with a ~75mm transverse stiffener underneath the front seats. By design the stiffener does not have continuous contact with the floor. Water can therefore migrate freely between the front and back footwells at floor-pan level. If the source of the leak is the sunroof (as opposed to the screen, heater, pollen filter etc) you can confirm this quickly by pulling off the top of the front door seal and/or the screen pillar trim on the affected side. You may have to remove the front grab-handle to gain sufficient access above the headlining though, but this is relatively quick and easy. If this is the source of the leak, you will see obvious dampness in this area (especially on the curtain airbag). In the 'Analysis and Testing' section of the document, I describe how to rule out issues with the drain tubes. What I failed to mention though is that you should inspect the curtain airbag discharge cylinder for corrosion - it’s located at the top of the B&C post. If it is corroded, it could fill the cabin with metal fragments upon discharge. You say you've just bought the vehicle? Well then, someone's just sold it, so consider that this may have been their motivation for selling it. A 30 second internet search will tell you the cause is due to the drain tubes being blocked, so it’s entirely possible that they’ve already been checked. They weren’t the bad guys in my case, and I suspect in numerous other cases where they’re blamed, although I will concede that they will exacerbate the problem if they’re under-performant. If you read nothing more of my document than the summary, you will see that a successful repair can be effected from the outside, without any dismantling. Good luck trying to dry the underfelt out in-situ though. Mine spent a week on a clothes airer, in a big warm house before it was fully dry. Come the summer though, it will dry out eventually as long as the leak is fixed, the car is in regular service, and you use the air-con to feed it with plenty of warm dry air. To those whose sunroofs don't leak, I would proffer the following: There are two sorts of panoramic roofs in these vehicles - those which leak, and those which are about to. As I demonstrated, the repair can actually be quite simple. The hard part is mopping up the ensuing damage. You consider my approach as a preventative measure. Good luck with your repair. Please post back with you experience. Regards to all ...

This article describes locating and rectifying a catastrophic water leak into the nearside passenger compartment of a six year old Škoda Yeti, which had a standard-fit panoramic sunroof. The leak was traced to the NSF corner of the sunroof by removing the top of the NSF door seal and the NSF screen pillar trim. Subsequent removal of the headlining and testing of the sunroof showed the cause to be failure of the seal between the aluminium channel forming the nearside of the sunroof frame, and the plastic channel forming the front of the sunroof frame. The sunroof was removed from the car in order to run a penetrating sealer vertically down into the defective join, using a syringe and needle. Upon re-fitting the sunroof, the remediation was found to be successful, however the corresponding join on the offside front had been compromised, presumably because of the mechanical trauma inflicted on the structure during re-fitting. The offside join was subsequently sealed successfully with the sunroof in-situ, using the same method. Experience showed that (once correctly identified) a repair could have been effected without any dismantling, although the seats, carpet and underlay were subsequently removed in order to dry them properly. The full story, together with annotated images is in the attached pdf document. If you're suffering with the same problem, I hope you'll find it of help. Please post any comments or questions. Yeti Panoramic Roof Leak.pdf