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Has anyone been able to clear the rear sunroof drain tubes?
The front tubes inlets are easily seen from
the sunroof but the rear ones are deep in there?
I removed the rear panels and located the tubes, then ran a weed wacker line up as much as it could go however I couldn’t make it go all the way. As you can see a bunch of white chunks came out. The end of the tube is attached to a black sleeve which exits the car. I pulled it out of the sleeve to gain access to the end. Inside the end of the tube has a corkscrew like plastic piece inside which I removed with a needle nose pliers. I did a water test and water came flowing out but still leaked through the headliner.
My next move will be to use a compressor and blow air up. Any other ideas?
I have not had to clear the sunroof drains in my wife's 2015 RX350 yet. But in our previous sedans in which the sunroof drains tended to clog every few years or so (always the rear drains, never the front drains), I always cleared them with compressed air. Some were easier to do than others.
I hate the various problems that sunroofs cause and always prefer not to have one. Hard to avoid them these days when almost every relatively upscale vehicle has a sunroof.
I always blow from the top of the sunroof down to the bottom of the tube underneath the car. I did not want to risk staining the headliner material by blowing from the bottom to the top. Worked for me every time.
As I mentioned, I have not had to clear the sunroof drains in my wife's 2015 RX350 yet. Perhaps someone else who has already done so can chime in here with additional advice.
Make sure you clean your sunroof drains or else this will happen
Apparently my rear sunroof drains were clogged or kinked.
Water leaked on headliner which was not noticed... trickled down the c pillar and into the cargo area.
Symptoms Foggy windows and smell
I took apart the hatch and cleaned it up real well however the smell persisted because water went over the hump and into the rear seat foot well. Luckily Lexus put a cross bar that separated the rear and front seats which stopped the water at that point.
So if you have water from a sunroof drain here are some pics of what your car will look like during the process.
Removed everything out of wheel well
Removed rear seats
Removed all plastics (cleaned up nice with mr clean magic eraser)
Removed seat belt bolts holding the seat belt to the floor to flip the carpet at its maximum
Removed the old jute carpet backing. You should replace back with auto jute but couldn't find any locally. I just reused 2 layers of house carpet backing which worked fine. I haven't notice any different in sound.
Hardest part was removal of the rear seats (Cable wire) I have another post with details on how to remove the cable wire.
Hi, I'm going through this process right now after witnessing a moldy front seat belt and water ingress in the boot compartment, For me I didn't have any kinks in the tube in the boot where it exits the car. Was your kink in that location?
Also did you perform any procedures on the headliner i.e removing it to check the tube is sealed to the sunroof? As my front seat belt was moldy I definitely think my issue might be at the sunroof/headliner level
I don't think the kink caused the problem because there was quite a bit of buildup that came out.
When testing the drains while clogged it did leak right down the seat belt area. This may have occurred because the clogged caused the water to backup to the joint between the drain tube and the connection to the sunroof.
You may not have to remove the entire headliner. I would suggest to remove the rear upper pillar (in cargo area) and the seatbelt (pillar) At this point you should be able to see the sunroof connection to the drain hose.
If water has leaked it will stay in the rear pan passenger pain. You may be able to remove the Rear passenger door sills and push your hand under the carpet to see if the sound deadening material is soaked. Keep in mind the carpet may be dry but there can be water sitting under it.
Any thoughts on how to remove the upper panels of the cargo area? Didn’t want to snap and break anything off as it’s very rigid there. I did remove the seat belt pillar and on the right side it’s dry while doing drain test. Still need to do the left side. Also thinking to soak the drains at the sunroof with some drain unblocker thinking that should help move the crud out
I would first run water through the sunroof drain before putting any chemicals just in case there is a leak.
Another thing I noticed even after clearing my drains is that if you overwhelm the drain with alot of water it will leak at the sunroof connection. Remember not alot of water goes through there. SO you may get a false positive if you drop a whole cup in there at once.
To remove the back upper pillar just pull and it will come off. They are just held in with plastic tabs. Make sure all the screws are out. I remember in my 2005 there was a screw behind the light which I didnt see. If I remember correctly you have to take out a screw that holds the hook for the cargo net.
Ok quick update, I removed all the trim panels and rear seats, lifted up the carpet and underneath was totally soaked, it seemed the water hadn't made its way to the front seats due to the chassis structure. For now I have stuck a humidifier in to collect the water. Mine's a hybrid so extra reason to be concerned about the water proximity to the batteries!
One interesting observation was that I couldn't recreate the water flowing down the B Pillars so I'm NOT100% sure if cleaning the sunroof drains has eliminated this issue from recurring, I cleared the drains anyway and was able to collect the same quantity of water that I ran down the channel (used a trolley jack to get the incline right to test each hole individually). Once the carpet underlay has dried I'm planning to do a soak test in case there is another orifice that's leaking.
I don;t understand why this isn't a more common issue for some of the other Gen 3 RXs. Any attaching a picture of the stripped interior if it helps anyone
As long as those drains are cleared your good to go, especially if you collected the same amount that was put in. Thank god they put a separation from the rear seats and the front seats. I can confirm with the (non hybrid anyway) that no water can go to the front area. I pulled my front seats out and checked. Did the sound deadening carpet backing dry? Mine was taking forever and had a smell so I just replaced it with house carpet backing. Didn't notice any increase noise in the cabin.
09-28-20, 02:28 PM
How to clear rear sunroof drain tubes
