Went into work and all was well, finished up got to the car opened the door and a door like a dead fish wafted out of the car, checked around the car opened the windows and headed home, got home and went back to the car after and hour and the smell is back!

Any ideas what I should check to see where the smell is coming from?

 

Thanks

Possibly mould in the air conditioning - you can get aircon anti-bacterial bombs to treat this.  Or maybe water ingress and you've got damp in or under your carpet?

 

An over ripe pollen filter can cause similar whiffs.

 

Gaz

Edited 15 February, 20197 yr by V6TDI

Thanks, Will check in the morning along with the pollen filter , very strange how It started all of a sudden 

Have you checked for an actual dead fish? 

9 minutes ago, MoggyTech said:

Have you checked for an actual dead fish? 

Damn, beat me to it.

 

Living close to the coast ....but not that close  the only other thing I can think of is that I had the car washed today, wonder if that could have inadvertently triggered the smell

Check for damp carpets, although in my experience that smells like bad milk mixed with mould.

 

On a similar thing, a good 17 years ago I bought a 32" flatscreen TV from Comet. The box it came in was huge and wouldnt fit in my car (Seat Arosa of all things think Citigo but smaller) so I called dad to pick it up in his mk1 Leon. I got home to find el Leon on the drive, all doors and boot wide open and dad complaining that the smell off my new TV had made him boak all the way home. Odd. Turns out there was something else in the car. See my dad worked for a local charity, one which collected unsold food from marks and spencers, bagged it up and distributed it to the needy. Dad used his own car for this. Turns out a pack of chicken had gone rogue and got out of a bag, ended up under the front seat and when he moved it to fit my new LG HD Ready TV on the back seat he had sliced open a pack of rancid chicken breasts that had been under there for about 3 months.

 

Long story short, look under the seats.

My dealer did a free bacterial cleaning of the air vents throughtout the car last month at the first service and it had that new car smell again. Best of all NO COST. On a less serious point you didn't upset the guys who cleaned your car did you. They might keep a bucket of mackerels round the back for poor tippers or grumpy customers and slipped under one of the front seats when you were not looking. Just a thought, might be a Latvian joke.

23 minutes ago, shyVRS245 said:

My dealer did a free bacterial cleaning of the air vents throughtout the car last month at the first service and it had that new car smell again. Best of all NO COST. On a less serious point you didn't upset the guys who cleaned your car did you. They might keep a bucket of mackerels round the back for poor tippers or grumpy customers and slipped under one of the front seats when you were not looking. Just a thought, might be a Latvian joke.

Gave them a good tip  smell is coming from the back vent which was closed over the last few months, clean bomb tomorrow me thinks, cheers guys, will let you know how I get on.

I have had good results with air conditioning refresh spray from Wurth which I got from my local ATS Euromaster. It kills germs that cause such bad smells.

 

I would change the pollen filter and then hit the car with a can or Wurth. I believe the charge for a can and them to do it is £20 but I do know they will sell you the can to do it yourself.

 

If you are by the sea, have you checked the area at the base of the windscreen to make sure some seagull hasn't accidentally dropped its lunch into the air inlet?

 

Good luck,

Paul.

 

 

Edited 15 February, 20197 yr by Papfox