Need To Remove Carpet From Passat, Have to remove bottom of the dash board?? Options

[skibum]

Help!
Had a funny feeling that there water in the car as windows were always misting up, with a lot of condensation on the inside. Did the usual checks in the plenum chamber (found about 2 inches of water as both drains were blocked) and the seal around the pollen filter housing (original seal had perished). I stuck a de-humidifier in the car for a week, it produced a couple of litres but the windows were still misting up.

So I took the plunge today and removed the seats, door trims, plastics around the gear stick / hand brake and lifted the carpet to find a lot of water in the footwells and the carpet was completely soaked (IMG:style_emoticons/default/sad.gif)

Looks like the carpet is one piece and the only way to completely remove it is to cut it behind / under the center of the dash of remove the dash.

how big a job is it to remove the radio and bottom dash of a 03 passat? Any online guides pictures etc??

Need to put the car back to gether as soon as possible.

Luckily enough the CCM module was bone dry, and the wire's look ok.

Thanks

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[Brian.G]

i remember being in your shoes before, i remember looking up under dash and thinking , right theres a lot of things screwed down through the carpet way up under dash, some i couldent even see, i chose not to take out dash as it wasent my car and it wouldent pay, and it would also be criminal to cut the carpet, so i just left a heater in the car after the dehumidifier, it seemed to dry it out ok, i suppose if it was my own car i might have fully removed it..maybe, ide say dry it as best you can and put the heater to the floor the next few weeks maybe with the sil trim off and a thin but of wood under carpet to make an air gap, the floor will look ok and the floor usable, the choice is up to you really, i just hate pulling dashes...

[Declan]

Get your CCM module under the passenger footwell lifted and tried out ASAP also

Dec

[Geo]

I agree with Brian, I'd try to dry the carpet out in situ rather than removing it. I have removed carpets from them before to repair wiring but it's not something you'd be doing for the fun of it (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)

[skibum]

Think I'm going to leave dry out as it is. Seems to be a fair bit in removing the dash. Have the de-humidifier going at the moment, still "sucking" out a lot of water. The padding under the carpet is still very damp so I'm going to do as Brian suggested, stick a bit of wood under the carpet to create a void where the air / moisture can circulate.

Thankfully the ccm was bone dry, it was the first thing I checked when I realised that water had got into the car.

From looking at passat forums this is a very common problem with the B5 & B5.5 passat, serious design flaws, water getting through the pollen filter, bonnet pull gromet and filling up the plenum chamber where the battery sits.

[Brian.G]

your dead right, life is too short for ''dash out'' jobs (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)

[skibum]

your dead right, life is too short for ''dash out'' jobs (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)

Taking it out would be the easy part, putting the fucker back together is another story (IMG:style_emoticons/default/blink.gif) , I did two heater matrix's on mk2's they were relativly ok, but the passat looks like it's a bugger of a job!!

[Declan]

Your dead right on the common problem part.

I've addressed two in my work place with it. Blocked plenum drains and bad seals. Never happened with mine but I new about it of from early so kept em clear.

At least your CCM is ok. The next level on this problem is a fupped CCM and rotten wiring