mazz918

Hi everybody, I'm new to the forum, just wanted to say thanks for being here, it's a super helpful site. Anyway, so I had an issue with water leaking in under the glove box. I finally located and stopped the leak, but when it had begun leaking I had to remove the carpets. Since then, some rust has begun on various areas of the floor, and so now I have removed all the seats, center console, and trim near the floor so that I can work on it. My plan is to sand off all the loose stuff, cut out the few areas it has rusted through, and then put penetrol all over it, then patch the holes I cut. My issue is that the cross members the front seats bolt to are welded to the floor, and I really want to get underneath them to do that area too. I want to cut them out and then bolt them back in place because I don't have access to a welding torch. Does anyone think that this might cause any structural issues? It's a 2000 Cherokee Sport. Thanks!

wmpttr125

What was causing the water to leak? My 98 Cherokee is leaking from the same place.

mazz918

It's a little bit hard to describe, but I'll take a picture in the morning. On the driver's side of the cowl, it's vented because that's where the windshield wiper motor is. Rain can get in there, but it's supposed to drain off to the sides of the car. Inside the engine compartment, you can see the seam where the cowl is attached to the rest of the body. Over on the passenger side, the seam wasn't sealed properly which allowed the water entering the cowl to drip into the engine compartment. That leak was right above what I think is the air conditioner compressor... I could be wrong about that but it's a part that comes through on both sides of the firewall, right behind the glove box. Where it goes through the firewall it isn't sealed. Not sure if it's supposed to be or not. Regardless, the leak dripped right on top of it, and it pooled on it, leaked through the firewall, and dripped down and pooled on the passenger side floor. Sometimes it would take a lot of rain to make it leak inside because there is foam between the component and the firewall which soaks some water up.

I don't know if this is just an issue that Cherokees have or if it was because my aunt (the previous owner) had gotten into a head-on collision and had the whole front end replaced.

wmpttr125

I'll have to take a look at mine tomorrow. I've never wrecked mine, it just randomly started leaking last week in that same spot

mazz918

Yeah I'll try to get a picture tomorrow of the seam. I threw some JB Weld on it to seal it up. I can't really see why cutting out then bolting down those crossmembers would cause problems, but I just want some other opinions before I actually do it.

wiggles

Drill out the spot welds holding it in, it is perfectly fine structurally.. the earlier ones didn't even have it lol

mazz918

I knew that some models don't have the cross members, but I wasn't sure if there was something else underneath or something like that which added to the structure of the body. As for drilling it out, if I'm remembering correctly it's not a spot weld, it's welded along the entire edge. Probably going to take a dremel to it.

mazz918

Here's where I sealed up the leak. First one is zoomed out to give you some perspective, its where I circled in red. The lighter gray is the JB Weld that I used to seal up the seam.

wmpttr125

I just looked at mine, it looks like its leaking in the same spot. I guess I'll be using some JB weld too

mazz918

It's funny, my aunt had brought it to 4 different places to try to find the leak, and none of them could even cause it to leak. I brought it somewhere, and they made it leak but told me they'd have to remove the whole dashboard to find it which would be expensive. I ignored it for a while, and then one day decided to try to make it leak and narrow it down on my own. Found it and plugged it within an hour...