Damp smell in my car still hasn't gone away!

[MGTI94]

Hi all,

I bought a Mk5 a little over a year ago now (November 2018) and the one thing we noticed was a strong damp smell on the drive home. The trader told us it had just been valeted and we assumed the seats would still be damp - no problem.

Fast forward a few, cold months and we noticed that there was around 3-4 inches of water in the spare wheel well. We eventually traced this to the rubber umbilicals not being seated properly and we sealed these up effectively. The boot was dried and the leak seemed fixed. The smell persisted.

I have just got round to asking a professional valet to give my car a deep clean, summarising that the water may have got into the carpets and the smell could be emanating from there. After 2 weeks of smell-free driving, it returned. Now that I know the car's carpets, seats and boot have been steam cleaned, I'm scratching my head at what else it could be:

• The spare wheel well - the space saver is rusted through and probably needs to be scrapped as I doubt it would even go on. The felt covering the boot floor also has mould on the overside (though there was no smell on the felt)
• The air con module. We've used air con bombs in the past and it's temporarily smelt better. I've tried to test whether the smell is directly attributable to when the heater comes on, and as far as I can tell, it isn't. If the air is musty, though, surely it would just smell. If I get the air con module regassed, does the unit get removed? Is there a possibility of the air being musty? I should point out that the car was stood in a barn for a few years prior to me picking her up so the air is potentially mouldy. There is no water in the passenger mat, so it's not leaking.
  
• Something else - maybe the underlay of the carpets are rotted through.

I'm really just after some help addressing the problem. It's embarrassing saying 'I'll give you a lift, but mind the smell' and after a year of ownership, I really should be tackling it so I can enjoy driving her!

Any help would really be appreciated!

Thanks in advance!
-Matt

[momo.mk5GTI]

Try to replace cabin filter, sometimes when cabin filter is not change a very long time just smels. And look every where that you dant have a something who died under the wipers plastic. A years ago i was find a mouse who died there he was exploded there its just blqh...

[terrier]

Possibly a flood damaged car. Perhaps find out where its previous owners lived

[TheBALDpuma]

IMO it's all down to the leak in the spare tyre well.  It's probably got into the carpets/upholstrey somewhere and in my experience once you get certain smells intothe fabric of a car, they are there for good.  A valet will seem to fix it in the short term, but given time the smell always seems to creep back in.

My wife's last car was a mazda 2.  She owned that thing around 7 years.  When we test drove it we notice it smelled faintly of smoke.  They gave it a full valet and voila, it smelled fine when we drove it home a weeks or so later.   A month or so into ownership the smell was back, so we took it back to them -they cleaned it again and the same thing happened.  So I had a go myself, full clean out and deoderise.  Same thing happened. 

It still smelt of smoke when we sold it 7 years later.

I know what's not what you want to hear, and damp smell I reckon may be easier to get rid of than smoke, but lingering smells can really linger!

[titchy]

Try Fabreze its not a cure but it lasts a while

[Mekaniko]

Same problem with my GTI V, once I repairded the water leak issue on the boot  the bad smels continues so finally I go to a detailer for a Ozone treatment and now it smells like a normal car.

Hope it helps.

[MGTI94]

Hi all,

Apologies for the late reply to this - we've been considering the problem and I'd like to report back on what (we think) has fixed it in case anyone else is in a similar position.

We decided to take the seats out, strip the trim and take the carpet out to evaluate the condition of the underlay and, as we expected, the underlay was black in patches and carried the smell. The smell actually got worse the closer we got to the carpet, so we figured we were onto a winner. The underlay has been bagged and, when we're able to, we'll scrap this at the tip as there is no value in keeping it.

I've now gone in and vacuumed/cleaned the metal and refitted the seats so that it's driveable. The trim has been scrubbed clean and we've treated the underside of the carpet to a carpet cleaner and stored all of it in the garage until we can sort some new underlay out. The trim and carpet smell lovely and, so far, the smell in the car seems to have disappeared!

Now we just to sort some new underlay out (I have no idea where to buy this from!) and refit the carpet and seats for good, knowing the shell of the car is solid and clean.

So I just wanted to mention that we think we've solved it, and we'll let the metal shell breathe for a few weeks/months before fitting it all back together 

Thanks for all your help/comments with this one. 

[roryscott30]

Hi there, cabin at the foot wells. Cleared the drain holes, no more water and no more smell. Just one item removed from the endless list for me....

[LC5F]

Ebay has lots of car underlay choices - bear in mind you will have a lot of cutting to fit - Wool looks good and cheap
Or you could go commando and fit the carpets without underlay.

[MGTI94]

We were thinking of just fitting the carpet back in with underlay. Took it for a quick spin with no carpet in and the cabin noise is fine. No problem at all! If sourcing underlay proves difficult, we may just re-lay the carpet in.

@roryscott30 , mine has a sunroof and im dreading the time when we have to clear the drainage tubes! Haven't done them yet and owned the car 18 months.. Maybe a summer job, nothing else to do!

[phrozen]

maybe a sound dampender/deadener all in one solution could work? I used a dodomat product in my skyline and it worked great

[bobby_fodge]

Ebay search for closed cell foam. It'll have adhesive back on one side and comes in a4 ish sizes or bigger sheets that you'll have to cut. This is one of the standard products the audio installers use for sound absorption.

I'd just buy some carpet underlay. They do different thicknesses.