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My 86 leaked from the windshield and the doors. My 88 leaked from the rear window, the firewall by the fuse box, the drivers door, and the A/C drain. My 90 leaks from the heater core. And that's only the leaks I can remember offhand. Many of those leaks were NOT easily noticeable and pooled water under the carpet for god knows how long before I caught it.. :( They are old trucks with some common leak locations and every owner is recommended to pull the carpeting and check for moisture..

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While we're on the subject, a neat trick I've found for tracking down leaks is to dry the entire area, then sprinkle baby power everywhere. Then either hit it with the hose or wait for the rain. There have even been reports of water splashing up through imperfections in the floor.

 

Oh, and don't forget rain getting in past the aging side window seals and pooling up in the doors because the drain holes are plugged.

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My heater core was the only leak I found, but since I am in Florida, I just bypassed it and let it go. No need for the heater here ;) .

 

The old weathered door seals can be replaced with the slightly thicker ones from a later model 4 door XJ to stop leaks around the doors :cheers: .

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rained like hell here today.the water pours in through the vent window rubber gaskets,drips on the interior door panels and puddles on the floor. this explains why the door panel cardboard was wet when i changed the radio speakers last month.if this is the only leak i am going to swap the fixed vents from my 1993 xj parts truck.will they fit my 88 mj? are they less likely to leak water?the vents always had wind noise so i was planning to swap them out eventually to the fixed type but now i will move this mod to the top of the list.

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  • 2 weeks later...
  • 3 weeks later...

swapped out the vent windows today.installed my jy remote mirrors.got ambitious(why not,high 70's,sunny,slight south breeze)and yanked off the drivers door and replaced the worn hinge pins and adjusted it to close properly. supposed to rain tomorrow.we will see if yanking out the moveable vents cures all the leaks or just slows them down! old non remote mirrors for sale.10 bucks for the pair and they are in nice shape.shipping extra.they should fit in a usps flat rate box which is about 9.00. i take paypal.

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Door gaskets leak at the top sometime. Garden hose spray with the door shut to check for this. The fire wall leak around the fuse panel drove me crazy for some time. Kept trying to seal it up utill I realized, the hood gasket was dry rot and allowing the water to run down the fire wall in the first place! Short of changing the gasket, I pushed a piece of 1/8 inch diameter round home insulation foam (Frost King) into the inside of gasket to give it some of it's orginal profile back. Worked great.

 

Red Dog

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Door gaskets leak at the top sometime. Garden hose spray with the door shut to check for this. The fire wall leak around the fuse panel drove me crazy for some time. Kept trying to seal it up utill I realized, the hood gasket was dry rot and allowing the water to run down the fire wall in the first place! Short of changing the gasket, I pushed a piece of 1/8 inch diameter round home insulation foam (Frost King) into the inside of gasket to give it some of it's orginal profile back. Worked great.

 

Red Dog

 

Hand washing it with it running and the blower motor on high will work great for finding leaks. Use a good amount of soap and just watch for bubbles.

 

If you need to buy new door gaskets get ones for the 97 and newer XJ's. They seal better.

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  • 2 months later...

I seem to have two spots leaking right now. I have the entire inside gutted, and it has rained like heck here over the last few weeks.

 

Both leaks are on the passenger side. The front leak appears to be coming from up under the dash, though I haven't pinpointed it yet. Looks like on the firewall wall somewhere. The rear leak is from the sliding window. It looks like it is pooling in the slider rail, then coming over the inside lip and down the back of the cab. Other than silicone, how can I fix this?

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"Other than silicone"? Silicone is great! I prefer a tube of exterior grade household black silicone in a caulking gun. But you may want to narrow down the exact point of entry with baby powder first.

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I am ASSuming the leak is across the entire bottom of the window. It is parked on a slight incline with the cab facing downhill.

 

Silicone will be fine for the under dash stuff, but I'd like to keep the interior as clean as possible. I suppose I could do it and still make it look nice...

 

I'll check it out this weekend and see what I find. Dang weather is too hot right now to do anything....

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That's why I use black. You don't need a huge glob of it to seal so just use your finger and smooth it out. Do it right and no one would ever know. :D

A tip: keep a box of tissues and a trash can handy. Silicone tries to get everywhere when you're forming it with your fingers and it's real nice to be able to wipe up a drip right away and dispose of it.

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Mine leaked on both sides at the door, ran down past the hinges under the door sill plate and then ran into the cab from under the sill. Turned out to be the strip of seal JEEP added to the under side of the A pillar when they found out they had a leak problem. I pryed them away from the pillar a bit & squirted sealer under them & then used masking tape to hold them tight against the pillar until the sealer dryed. Haven't had a leaak since. Here's a pic of that rubber strip.

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