Fumes through the air vents!!!!

**Cupra** · 07-02-2010, 04:49 PM

Hi all,

For a while now (at least 2 months) i've been having a problem with the cupra where if I have fresh air selected I get a sweet fumy smell out of the vents. To me it smells like a sweet exhaust type of smell, my wife thinks it smells like fuel & refuses to go in the car any more. With recirculate selected the smell goes away immediately.

I've had the leaking fuel pipes in the engine bay problem in the past but that didn't stop me spending a fair bit of time trying to hunt down the culprit!

Firstly let me say that there are no fluid leaks in the engine bay, that's a good thing

. I don't know how many times i've checked under the bonnet over the last couple of months

but I arrived home from a late flight at 2 am the other morning & while the car was idling in the drive I noticed visible fumes ( almost like smoke ) around the drivers headlight & the smell was strong.

I put the car in the garage & with all the lights on there was nothing except the smell

.

So today was allocated to sorting this out

.

I started by pulling the airbox out to check the charcoal canister & with everything out I ran the engine, there was the smell, in front of the engine & there seemed to be some puffing air flow I hadn't noticed before behind the alternator, ok that seems strange, I pulled some of the plastic covers off & looked further, then I noticed something moving down by the dip stick, bingo

The main crankcase breather pipe hiding under the main water pipe!!!!!!!!!!!!

This angle is deceptive & one of the covers is off, the hole looks obvious but if you stand in front of the car to check the oil the hole isn't in sight!

At a glance it looks like someone has cut a section out of the pipe but the pipe in that area is heavily perished over the full diameter.

So with the aid of my trusty helper I made a quick repair to keep the car on the road while I hunt for a new pipe

I am so happy to have found the cause, happy Seat owner again

Phil

**Greggles4** · 07-02-2010, 09:11 PM

glad to hear you found the leak, BTW the Cupra looks great.
Greg

**leo46** · 08-02-2010, 12:29 AM

Yeah your car is mint! I want it!

**sleg** · 08-02-2010, 03:49 AM

My wife was driving the Virus a while back and had the same visible smoke in the vents, have been trying to find the fault as it has not happened to me. Will definitely be looking at all the breather pipes.

Cheers