Hey!
I found some water behing the drivers side storage bin today. I heard that this is a problem area on rx7's. Where should I start looking for the source of the water?
Is it a body seam, or might it be the moonroof drains. Any info on where to start, before I tear apart the car would be greatly appreciated!

 

mine does the same.. check the hatch seal and the seals around the doors..

 

Yea. First look and see if the spare tire is full of water. Then clean out all of your drains.

 

It's your moonroof draines. There is a tube that's in the B piller from the moonroof to the vents near the rear qtr panel. It's a common leak - That's why there are so many first gens with rusted bins.

 

Check for rust holes to the sides of the bins in the inner wheel wells. Sometimes this is the problem, most likely the moon roof drains though, also check the hatch drains in back.

 

Thanks, no rust anywhere right now. I figured it was prob the moonroof drains. They look to be a PITA to replace.

 

And since you are already working on the problem, pull the plastic plugs in the bins. They tend to grow into the metal after 20 some years.. Its also a good idea to rust proof the bins while you are at it!

 

ive heard of these storage bins, but neither the 79 or 80 i have, have them? why not??

 

I gotta fix my moon roof it leaks and all that water goes behind the bins....what is this tube were is it located by the top of the moon roof?

 

i thought the bins rust out simply because of the salt that gets in there from the tire picking it up off the road and throwing it around inside the wheel well.

so the main culprit of the bins rusting out is from the sunroof drains not draining properly?

it seems there is two areas the bins rust out. on the bottom outer edge, and also on the sides. which part of the bin rusts out from the drains? i guess the bottom? and so the sides rusting out must be from salt then? (when i say sides, i mean about a foot or so up from the floor)

nick

 

bump!.... i need an answer PLEASE??? im just all THAT curious

 

I'm wondering about the moonroof drains too. I have some rust behind the bins, and from what I can see, its from inside the wheeel well. From the factory there seems to be a sort of "patch" welded to the inner rear fender on each side which overlaps the existing inner fender. There is a small gap in this patch, and I can just see daylight from inside the storage looking out the inner fender.

I always figured the rust came from there!

 

I found some severe rust on my recently purchased 84 GSL-SE. How to describe it, hmm... it is the rear wheel well , in fornt of the rear tires. I'm knew to these, but I guessed it was from road salt , as others suggested.

There was some repair work on the severe spot - the driver side. A rectangular plate in that area, say approx. 3" x 10 " , which is part of the unibody and visible from outside the car in the wheel well, has deteriorated badly and patched. Plastic filler used to cover can be seen cracking.

I'd be surpised if anyone makes a metal panel for that area, but I am hoping to get lucky.

Has anyone here ever done metal patching in these whell well areas on a severe rust case?

Looking forward to your replies.

 

Being from Ohio originally I've dealt with rust. My thoughts on where the rust comes from in this area is from junk getting between the pieces of metal inside the wheel well. I don't think there is much corrosion inhibitor of any kind getting into this spot. There might be primer(if the cars are dipped) but paint and undercoating don't make it. Any break in the under coating from a stone or whatever and I think the salt/water get in and start working. And we know rust never sleeps! I've done some pretty major repairs there and the great thing is nobody can see your finish body work. Cut out the cancer, weld in new tissue... er metal. I forget how close this spot is to the upper control arm mount, check that for sure. I havn't dealt with rust like that in 9 yrs.
Be happy it's not a FIAT! They didn't invent rust but they perfected it!

 

The 'patch', that is spot welded to the inner rear fender well, is to strengthen that area. the problem with the way Mazda installed these is, they didn't seal them very well. There are also 2 holes in the patch. Water, salt and moisture migrate behind this panel through these holes and the perimeter seam and the rust begins. There is a stiffening bracket at the lower link that does the same thing.

This is where most of the rust starts from, and as such needs to be addressed from this view point. Plugged sunroof drains can contribute to this rusting, but I have seen non-sunroof cars rust out the same way. If the roof drains are plugged, the channel that the roof sets in and seals to is more likely to rust than the bins.

Once the rust begins to migrate behind this patch, there are 3 layers, with voids, in which the rust can eat away at the fender wells, long before the rust is visible from the outside in the fender well or in the bin.

Repairs often require removal of the patch and the inner fender well, inside the car, with the hopes that the middle layer is still some what intact.

I have seen some repairs where all of the rust was cut out and replaced with fiberglass, this is not an acceptable repair for long term or strength. A new piece of sheet metal needs to be formed into shape and welded in, then properly sealed treated for rust prevention.

If someone would make an 1/8" patch panel that would cover even the more extreme rust outs, there would definitely be a market for it.

 

If this were my old jeep I'd rivet and tar this soldier and say back to work... but I will try to do this one correctly. I have someone cutting a section from a good RX7.
Not sure what's next...I guess reving some of this rust damage is next... must remove rearend too. Undercoating on this car was something called WAXOYL (sp?) and fasteners underneath look like they will be a bear.

 

The rear comes out easy with a 1/2 drive set and a LONNNNGGG pull handle.

You should take lots of pics as you do the repair. A few people have have had it done but no one took pics of the process.

I will snap a lot of pics as I cut the replacement panel for you. Got to hit the lowes tonight to get sawsall blades.

 

Capt,

Any updates?

 

Progress report on the rust repair:

The piece supplied by Hades 12 has been cut to fit and welded in place Sept 10. It went rather well I'd say, and I have never done this type of work before.

I placed the repair part in/up from the bottom side, with overlap varying from 1/2 to 1 1/2 inches. I welded the inside seam completely, and 80% of the outside. Access is difficult underneath the bottom. I will post a picture later.

Note: The upper link bracket that is spot welded to the box frame section. I did not remove was retained fram


I went to the passenger side and started poking around, and it got ugly. At this point the best repair strategy here is to remove the spot welds that secure the outer reinforcing plate (for the upper link) and fabricating a new reinforcing plate.

Anybody have experience on drilling the spots and removing this plate?

 

Yikes I was innterrupted (this job really interferes with my schedule) and did not finish that one note on the upper link bracket.

What I did was cut the box frame section and retained the flat side (about 4" x 5") of the box to which this upper link bracket is spot welded to.

I then welded that flat piece to the existing box section.