How2: Unblock the scuttle drain

How2 - Stop water getting into the car.

Now, I have seen this on many Cavaliers in the past, and the most common fault is that the "elephant trunk" in the bulk head gets blocked and allows the water to back up and flow down into the blower motor and into the heat matrix box.

This causes sometimes several problems.

1) It causes the bulkhead and surrounding areas to rot
2) It causes a god awful smell in the drivers cabin
3) Your carpets and soundproofing gets saturated
4) Windows constantly misting up due to warm vapour raising whilst the car warms through

And that is to mention but a few.

To resolve this problem, I find it best to remove the trunk and clean it out every other month, - more so in the Autumn / Winter time - more leaves to fall into the scuttle panel you see.

Step 1.
To gain access to the scuttle panel, you need to remove the rubber strip

Step 2. Remove the Window wiper arms from the motor and carefully lift the black plastic trimming off. If you rip or tear this plastic trimming - you will allow water to get into the motor regardless and it will need to be replaced. - On this, I am speaking from experience.

Step 3.
Remove any loose debris be it muck, leaves, wrappers and so on. You may notice some corrosion or rot on the inner wings at either side - now is an idea time to treat this before it gets too far to correct. It maybe worthwhile once getting everything cleaned up and dried (especially if you can live without the car for 24hours to cover the painted area and seams with Wax oil / under seal or the like - at least this way it's water proofed if anything does get in there.

Step 4.
Refitting is reversal of removal - taking care when refitting the plastic trimming over the scuttle panel.

Hope this helps.

Nice one Gary it surprising how many folk over look his, & its not just Cav's either, my vec b & c needed this attention too, as do all mk's of Astra, apart from the Mk1!!