firewall leak right below the panel that the steering shaft goes through.,

inside the firewall where the brake booster comes through. looks like this is rusted out. Somehow water much have been coming in..

needed to get these wires through the firewall, got a hole saw and opened up the clutch plate blank, the got a piece of pvc and was able to thread in the whole. It's not the entire way through the firewall, but it should do the trick. I used a foot pad from an old air compressor to block off the opening.

pulled the cowl, this is what the trough looks like. I'm not sure where the seams are that go down along the firewall, but I had sprayed some the rustoleum flex seal in there..no luck it was still leaking..

this is the trough before I re-sprayed it.

this small hole, which I'm pretty sure it there to drain water into the trough is underneath the windshield trim..it was a little clogged up with debris, so I cleared it out. while I was there, I also put a bead of silicone in that lower gap between the windshield and the body.

this is the trough after I sprayed it again with the flex seal material. this initial application didn't do anything. if you're going to use the flex seal you'll need to lay it on very heavy.

it poured again...

and there is the water...so either I didn't seal the trough good enough or the leak is coming from somewhere else.

getting ready to replace the windshield for the 2nd time in the last 2 years. this time the guy removed all of the old sealant from the frame. hoping this will cure my leak.

you can see in the upper right hand corner what looks like rust. it's doubtful, but maybe the water was getting in through there.

So after all that is still leaked. clearly my problem was not the windshield.

I used a tube of the Dyantron seam sealer to try and address the leak..my assumption was that it was still coming from the trough..even using a hose I couldn't get it to leak, it would only do it after it rained.

used what was left of the dynatron grey seam sealer I had and spread it across every possible crease/crack I could reach in the trough..

this application of seam sealer was not nearly enough.

got a as close to the drivers side fender as possible..it was difficult getting my arm in there...

It poured yesterday and I mean torrential....the only thing the tarp did was keep the water off my back seat. there was a pool of water in the back..

no water under the floor mat.. it looks like I finally solved my firewall leak..

That was short lived...the next rain the leak was back...

This is a pic from inside the trough. That lip runs the length of the trough on the firewall, I'll seal that up with the seam sealer.

still wet after the last application of seam sealer.

got this brushable seam sealer and acid brushes from Eastwood. much cheaper than the stuff in the tubes and there is a lot more of it. the plan is to cover the entire bottom of the trough and up the sides on the firewall.

mix it up really good before applying.

I'm going to show how to remove the cowl to access the trough. First removed the windshield wipers.

starting from the top, I remove these phillips screws that hold the cowl down. There are 5 of them that run the length of the cowl.

you can see all of the holes for the cowl screws in this pic.

then pop the cover off the antenna mount and remove the 4 screws, pull the antenna up and unplug the cable. It may take a bit of effort.

remove the antenna cable

now under the hood. on mine at least, there are 4 additional screws there are two at opposite ends and two in the middle that hold the A/C hose brackets in place. Just unscrew them.

only thing left is to disconnect the windshield washer hose. I cut mine in the middle and splice it with a vacuum connector to make it easier to remove.

once that's done the cowl is ready to come off. for those of you concerned with your paint, you may want to loosen the hood bolts and slide it forward a bit. I'm not so I just manipulate the cowl away from the windshield until it's out and over the wiper arm mounts..

and you're done..

this pic is from the inside of the trough facing the firewall. The black stuff at the top is a putty like substance that was put there from the factory..I'm assuming to prevent leaks..

over the years, I'm sure it has started to deteriorate. I'm going to cover the entire area with a load of seam sealer.

there you go...

I went back an covered over this area again.

Result of a heavy storm last night. Even after applying the seam sealer across the seam on the inside of the trough I still had water on the floor board..

This is a picture from inside of the trough. In addition to applying the seam sealer along the seam at the top, I ran another coating across the bottom. At the far left of the picture you can also see a metal screw sticking through the firewall. I'm not sure if water could have been leaking there, but I covered that up as well.

This is the area where the brake booster meets the firewall..I had pulled the booster and sealed it with RTV a while ago, but I found areas at the corners that were suspect so I used the sealer putty I have to cover those.

we had some rain, nothing major, maybe a 15 or 20 minute shower, but the floor board stayed dry.

got a pretty decent down pour. I'd say 30 to 45 minutes of heavy rain.

from the inside watching the rain come down...

floor board is dry.

Determined to find the leak, I sprayed the hose in the spot I thought it was most likely coming from.

The water was being sprayed across the top of the brake booster and near the clutch plate cover.

Water dripping down after spraying around the brake booster.

top of the brake booster where it meets the firewall. this is the suspect area,

after applying a copious amount of seam sealer across the top of the brake booster, the leak has gone away..at some point down the road I'll want to clean this up and properly seal the brake booster, I'm just happy it's no longer leaking.