Hi I'm a newbie and totally frustrated with a sunroof water leak in my 2011 G37 S. I know the leak is at the firewall. I want to pull out the drain plug, which I know it's hard to reach without taking out the dash, but after I removed the A pillar I see there's a defroster vent in the dash blocking the drain plug. (I'm not talking about the big AC vent. It's the vent that the pillar actually connects into).

If I could remove that vent, it would give me easier access to the drain plug. It seems like I can just pull it out when I tug on it a little, but I'm not positive and I'm afraid to pull and screw things up. My worst fear is I can't get it hooked back up without taking apart the dash.

Does anyone have experience removing this vent? And does it just pull out and push back in?

​​​​ This shows the upper vent I'm talking about. It runs right beside the drain tube. Removing it would give a clear shot to the drain plug.

 

Welcome to the board.

There are probably videos and DIY instructions in the, well, DIY forum.

Those drains clog too damned easily. My car has flooded three times, the last a year after I dropped $1,200 to have the interior removd to get at the water under the carpet and to have the drains cleaned. This time I Gorilla taped the sunroof closed. I never use the thing anyway. The drain line fits through a grommet in the firewall and this grommet gets hard and cracks. This is the most common leak point. Best of luck.

 

Well geeze don't discourage me too much :'( Blocking the holes in the sunroof is a solution to maybe stop the front leaks but thats just setting you up eventually for back tube leaks.because.....

Water still drains into the sunroof everytime it pours rain. You would think it's a super tight seal but it's not. So if the front drains are blocked then it has to resort to the back drains, which if debris gets in there they will eventually clog too and it's even more difficult to reach those!

Also if your car is parked and the front end is on a decline, water will build up in the sunroof steel liner there and spill over the sides and leak down the pillars. But if you haven't had these issues lucky you!!

I still need to know if anyone has tried removing that upper defroster vent!

 

Idk if you're still interested, but I was in the same boat you're in. If you remove the clip that holds it to the larger vent it feels like it may pull out directly but doesn't because it is connected somewhere behind the dashboard. I pulled it out as far as I could and cut the whole thing of with a razor blade, I never use the defroster anyways (Florida). If I really wanted to reattach it i could with some JB Plastic Weld.