# water leak internal habitation on Autotrail - Help !



## 117450 (Oct 14, 2008)

Hello, has anybody had any problems with water getting into the habitation area on an Autotrail motorhome. My Chieftain currently leaks water through the hecki area although I have taken the hecki out completely and resealed it. I have in desperation sealed it down completely from the roof but to no avail. Every time it rains I get significant amounts of water come through the hecki where it fits to the roof (the blue connectors). I have re sealed the chimney seal on the roof where the water collects when it rains, but still nothing seems to work.
I don't have much hair, but I am fast pulling what is left out.
Any suggestions greatly received, thanks
Colin


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## Spacerunner (Mar 18, 2006)

The problem is that the actual leak could be almost anywhere on the roof area, and the water running and eventually finding its way through in the Heki area.

What I would is, in the first place, is to unship any ceiling fittings to see if there were any trace of water in the roof cavity. Then if no result resort to a damp meter (hire shop?) to try to trace the actual entry point.

tracing leaks can be most frustrating, so it will be a long haul job.


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## maddie (Jan 4, 2006)

Hi Colin the leak may not be in the heiki,it could be further up or down the van running out at the H/Roof light.Check the seal around the fibreglass front/rear panel as sealing plastic to metal is notoriously hard.On all my seals of metal to plastic I double or triple seal using both GP mastic and low modulus silicon (high mod is no good) and a sikaflex type sealant around the outer edge for good measure.Hope you understand how I mean ie, inner edge seal with GP, outer edge with LM, then around the edge with masking tape the sikaflex or any preference you like so long as you have twin or triple full layers around the item you are sealing :lol: 
terry


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## jedi (Nov 22, 2007)

Had a similar problem with my Apache. Sometimes when it rained water would run down inside the top cupboard then down the wall and behind the seat.
The point of entry was traced to the seal on the roof between the bulbous gps front and the flat roof, right in the corner. 

Luckily I caught the problem before any damage was caused.

Good luck with tracing your leak, Colin


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## TinaGlenn (Jul 7, 2006)

We recently discovered a leak with water running down from below the rear window seal, at first we thought it was from the window, but after duck taping all around the outside of it, there was still water coming in. Finally we found that the top roof panel had come away from the rear panel possibly due to someone being on the roof, the water was trickling down the inside of the rear panel until it got to the window seal and then coming in at the bottom corner. There was also a small leak traced to the very top brake light bar. Ours was all resealed under warranty by our dealer.

We used coloured water in the end to trace the leak. Took the inside out of an old felt tip and put it into a big jug with a couple of pints of water then tipped the water onto the roof to see where it ended up.

We're just waiting for the next lot of rain to double check it is all finally sorted out.

Good luck finding yours
Tina


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## locovan (Oct 17, 2007)

*water leak*

We had a leak in a cupboard in our Autotrail entering through the chimney seal.
No matter how many times we resealed, when it rained, we had the same problem.
To fix it my husband prised the rubber skirt up the chimney to gain access to the mastic joint and scrapped all that out as it had become dried.
After resealing and sliding back the rubber skirt we have had no further troubles through the heavy rain of this summer.
Good luck.


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