Dust in vehicle

Dust in car is a fact of life. Some seal better than others, I understand Nissan even sell a rear door seal "upgrade" kit (sounds like admiting defeat on the OE spec rubbers to me), mates with Toyota have varying degrees of ingress. I have seen all sorts of mods using various sorts of door sealing stick on bits etc. none are 100% sucessful.

I drivea Hilux with canopy, there are enough gaps around the rear tailgate to drive a mini through, so I give up to the inevitable and make sure those items that must remain dust free go in the cab or are "bagged" and sealed. (Bit of a pain, but thats's life).

Cheers

Buggerlux

Wim,
My Nissan is virtually dust-free...................on the bitumen!!!!!!!!!
I've given up worrying about dust now. It isn't a real problem really anyway. It gets in around the back cargo doors but doesn't seem to go beyond the immediate area surrounding the doors (if you get my drift). I also prefer to drive with my window down to varying degrees which makes the whole idea of staying dust free pointless anyway.
When travelling in convoy, I try to remain back far enough not to be in the dust of those in front of me.
Of course the Patrol has barn doors and the GXL tojos etc have horizontal split doors. I believe the latter may be better at dust sealing, but the barns doors allow better access to the cargo area IMHO.

Cheers,

Wim,

I had a GQ for 14 years and no matter what I did there was always dust inside. Last year I replaced the poor old thing with a TD4.2 intercooled and have had no issues with dust at all. The series III comes with the upgraded rear door seal kit as standard.

Most of the "dust" traveling has been done through the Gulf country where the dust tends to crawl up walls so it's had a fairly thorough test.

My strategy is to run the dash fan on high all the time....pressure the cab with fresh air from the windscreen area and the dust can't get in through the door seals. It works. Let a window down and you are in deep shtoom.
You will get a very fine layer of dust whatever you do, but with the foregoing method it is minimised greatly. Re utes and canopies.... if you make an air scoop up top (big irrigation fittings are ideal) and channel air into the tub area while mobile, that will keep all the dust out of the back, with no sealing required on tailgates etc.....done it....it works well.

Hi Wim,
I've got a series I GU, I get a small amount in the back if the windows are down, but not serious. Pressursing the cabin with the fan on low seems to keep it pretty dust-free. I must be lucky, as I get the impression that there is really a dust problem with the series I & II. Suffice it to say that I haven't found the need for the series III kit.
My old GQ was a bit worse, but again pressurising it fixed the problem.
cheers,
Gerry

G'day Wim

First off ... dust seals on a Landie, ya gotta be kidding right.

Back to your question. Spent some time with the publican at Stone Henge last year, mongrel of a job but someone had to do it.

Anyway, asked him about dust ... the Disco at the time was overloaded with it.

His advice. Doesn't matter what vehicle, some are better than others to start. But after a few months they are all basically the same ... horrible. Landies of course are the most horrible.

Dust works its way between the seals and frame and after a relatively short time, the seals are rubbed/worn and in it comes. Stuff all ya can do about it except follow Roachie's advice re dust problems and bitumen.

Cheers

Don't have dust problems with the Explorer, unless some donkey opens a window when a road train goes by, she said, "wanted to get a better photo", did'nt get anything except a car full of dust, nearly bloody choked.

Baz.

Wim. My current 100 series is the best sealed car I've been in. The tailgate has a much better seal than the barn doors especially after a few years. When driving through deep rivers I barely get a drop in where as the 80 would get flooded, so the door seals are definately better. Often I find dust gets in through rubber gromets that have been pulled out when the wiring gets hooked. (worth a look if your car suddenly gets dustier than usual). Some cars however, there was never any attempt to seal them. A friend on picking up his brand new LR looked down to see the white line on the road through the gap in the door. Cheers Craig............

I'm happy with the dust sealing on my old ute. After a few thou on the dirt there's dust everywhere, real thick on the dash so don't need a dashmat. When I pull up in the drive after being away I know I've been somewhere great and friends shake their heads in disbelief. Dust...gotta love it. I give the laptop a blow inside fairly quick but enjoy the dust inside the vehicle for a few weeks before cleaning up.

I'm reasonably happy with the gu - but like a number of other when in really dusty country I tend to pressurise the cabin. I do this by putting duct tape over the flow-through vents at the rear (outside both sides) of the vehicle and this gives a far better positive pressure inside the cab. The drawback of this of course is that you really have to give the doors a good shove to close them.
Cheers
Pete

Hi Wim,
We don't have trouble with dust in the Mitsi Challenger we use. We always pressurise with the fresh air fan on half speed and keep the windows closed. Frankly I was surprised that it worked initially but we've just finished a long trip on dusty roads and had no problems. I wish the CT would operate the same. Am currently trying to seal it.
Cheers
Stewart

Hi Wim, I've had 3 Prados and they've all had excellent dust sealing and I've been on many dusty roads in all of them. They just don't leak! I was surprised to see posts that Nissans let dust in - experience of friends is that they don't. No surprise that Discos let it in - can't seem to keep fluids in or dust out in those vehicles!

We had trouble with our GU letting dust in. Visually, you could see the dust just inside the rear door seals which didn't overly bother us. The real problem was that in fine dust situations, we'd get enough dust ingress to start everyone sneezing. I posted about th problem on this forum some time ago and got some good replies but the best one was to pressurise the interior by setting the vents on fresh air rather than circulate. This simple solution virtually solved our dust problem. Previous 4WD was an NH Pajero. Never had a dust problem with that. The GU has barn doors, whereas the Paj had a single door so I wonder if the barn door configuration is generally more prone to dust!?

:o) Melissa

You won't believe me, BUT
My 14 year old GQ does not leak dust in at all.
I do use it on fresh air (if not following someone), but don't have a problem with dust inside! - period!