Until now I have experienced two kinds of water leakage in my Rover 75. One of them is (supposedly) causing a failure of the fuel pump power output, so 99% of the times the fuel pumps (both under bonnet and in tank) receive no power and the car isn’t able to start; this leakage is due to the water piling up in a small “pool” right above the BCU and the internal fusebox, where a rubber drain is supposed to prevent this occurence, but fails to do that if you live someplace where leaves and seeds from the trees fall on your car.
The area under the bonnet, the "pool" is right beneath the hood hinge.This area looks terribly dirty, but it's already been cleaned, so go figure what was inside there before. Needless to say it was filled by water, which fell inside the car, falling onto the fusebox area and wetting the passenger carpet.My father says the meaning of this is to prevent dirt pieces from falling under... I say instead it's just stupid engineering. The very first solid thing that falls in there is bound to clog the drain... in my case, a whole load of pinetree seeds filled the drain up to the top.Problem solved, I cut off the tip making the exit wide open.
The other drain, I discovered by pure chance. As I said, I investigated the first drain after the pumps failed to start, so I thought the pumps actually failed; I went and checked the in-tank pump, by pulling out the back seat; behold the surprise, there was another quite big pool of water in the recessed space close to the in-tank pump housing cover. I was able to trace the water stains up to the trunk, close to the rear lights; it was difficult to find the cause because everything was mostly dry, but I noticed a slight running water stain.
Water was stagnating in the corner of the wheel area, and caused a major wetting of everything close to that area.The vertical stain running on the metal gave away the water leakage.The red arrow points to the part were the silver decoration has a screw running into a hole, and that's where the water came in.This is your culprit, the round gasket pressing against the metal lost its ability to isolate the inside from the outside.I putted back everything together, and tested the gasket, even if I was already sure it was faulty. So I showered the area where I suspected the leakage to be (notice the nice courtesy rainbow)There you have it, a fresh water stream coming from the faulty gasket.Small pool formed in the trunk after the test (I had just dried the old pool, which was way larger than this). As soon as you brake, or are driving down a slope, the water streams donwards toward the backseat area, where it forms a secondary pool like the one I found.
I generously added silicone to the gasket area, both from outside and inside, and put everything back together, should be pretty much isolated by now. For the sake of it, I did the same treatment for all the accessible gaskets of the silver lining (there are two on both sides).
My no-power-to-fuel-pumps problem is not yet solved though, this car likes to play games, and when I see the pumps are working again, soon after, at the next engine start, they aren’t anymore. At this point, I suspect a faulty wire.
I live in Portugal. I have a Rover 75. There are also many pine trees here and the drains got blocked. This winter the carpets got soaked. The air bag light comes on, the ABS light comes on, and last friday the 13th the fuel pump died and left me with my 81year old mother who has alzheimer’s in 35 ºC heat on the motorway. Then I tried to call the insurance company for a tow-truck. They say I did not pay so they cancelled the insurance so no tow-truck, sorry. Then I tried to open the bonnet, the cable went loose so now no one will tell me how open it without breaking the grill.
Well, I have had many Rovers since my frist Rover P6 3500 V8 I bought when I was at university in the UK in 1976. I still have the V8 in my garage in Portugal.
For some reason I keep buying Rovers.
I had an Aston Martin DB5. That also gave lots of problems. No air conditioning and the clutches did not last long, usually after I let a girlfriend drive it or the mechanic from the local garage who would always take it for a ‘test’ drive.
Everyone here says I am mad driving old cars.
Can you tell me how I can open the bonnet without breaking the grill on the Rover 75? Everyone seems to act as if it is some big secret.
Wow James, that’s a tough story.
Anyway, to be sure what you mean by bonnet (afterall we speak two different languages, and english is for us just the common foreign language), are you referring to the metal hood that covers the whole of the engine chamber?
This?
In that case you have just to pull the lever in the driver’s front panel, just near the door, below your knee height, and another lever will stick out of the front grill, like this:
Raise this and you will be able to raise the bonnet.
Sometimes that lever can get stuck, as it happens on my car, so you have to identify it through the grill, I then use my pinky finger as a hook to push it on the side so it can get free and finally stick out to where you can grab it.
very very helpful your article about leaking in the trunk at rover 75.
I have the same problem and even and spend a lot of time to solve it, until now 🙂
The headquarters of Ephestione, online since 2001 ______________________________ ________________ _________________ Il quartier generale di Ephestione, online dal 2001
I live in Portugal. I have a Rover 75. There are also many pine trees here and the drains got blocked. This winter the carpets got soaked. The air bag light comes on, the ABS light comes on, and last friday the 13th the fuel pump died and left me with my 81year old mother who has alzheimer’s in 35 ºC heat on the motorway. Then I tried to call the insurance company for a tow-truck. They say I did not pay so they cancelled the insurance so no tow-truck, sorry. Then I tried to open the bonnet, the cable went loose so now no one will tell me how open it without breaking the grill.
Well, I have had many Rovers since my frist Rover P6 3500 V8 I bought when I was at university in the UK in 1976. I still have the V8 in my garage in Portugal.
For some reason I keep buying Rovers.
I had an Aston Martin DB5. That also gave lots of problems. No air conditioning and the clutches did not last long, usually after I let a girlfriend drive it or the mechanic from the local garage who would always take it for a ‘test’ drive.
Everyone here says I am mad driving old cars.
Can you tell me how I can open the bonnet without breaking the grill on the Rover 75? Everyone seems to act as if it is some big secret.
Wow James, that’s a tough story.
Anyway, to be sure what you mean by bonnet (afterall we speak two different languages, and english is for us just the common foreign language), are you referring to the metal hood that covers the whole of the engine chamber?
This?
In that case you have just to pull the lever in the driver’s front panel, just near the door, below your knee height, and another lever will stick out of the front grill, like this:
Raise this and you will be able to raise the bonnet.
Sometimes that lever can get stuck, as it happens on my car, so you have to identify it through the grill, I then use my pinky finger as a hook to push it on the side so it can get free and finally stick out to where you can grab it.
very very helpful your article about leaking in the trunk at rover 75.
I have the same problem and even and spend a lot of time to solve it, until now 🙂
thank you