Tahoe window seals??

[Voodude]

Changed weatherstripping this week for my 96 Tahoe 2 door liftgate. There was a slight leak last year around the rear windows fogging up and that dank smell in the winter. So in the fall I found some roof rot and had the body shop repair and thought it fixed it. Luckily no body rot and the rust didnt go through. Let it go and found there may have been some gaps that let water in. This time around we had some rain dump. The cargo area carpet was soaked. Wet Dry vacuumed it and extracted over half a bucketfull. Dang still soaked and pulled the carpet out that weighted like 60 lbs. Got to a break in rain for a week and left it out in the sun to dry completely.

Since then the changed the entire liftgate weatherstrip. Then followed up with the upper tailgate, middle liftgate window and 2 doors. It's time any way...22 years original owner.

BTW, picked up the weather stripping from LMCTrucks.com, A1Auto.com (They also list some items on Amazon if you have Prime for shipping)

 

[east302]

@Voodude

How did you leave the upper flap on the piece that goes along the top by the third brake light? My new one had a flap that looked like it could either stay folded down or rest on top of the lift glass. I wasn’t sure which was correct and left it folded down.

It’s the one with the little rubber string sticking out...

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[Voodude]

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East302,

Pulled the flat up and over to cover the channel. I'm the original owner never noticed before and saw it was like that when replaced. Funny thing from your question, the right side where the leak was the gasket was partially tucked in. Overtime and wear.

What a pain to attached, it was so tight and the kept creeping in when the tailgate was open/closed. I ended up carefully tapping in using a block of wood and rubber mallet

Included some pics...
First before with flap outside.
Second was where it was going in the channel.

 

[east302]

Thanks, I never could get mine to stay on top. It kept folding under one small section at a time when the lift glass was opened.

I notice that the replacement gasket had a lip and rubber string attached to that top flap where the original did not. I wondered if it was meant to be a pull string to aid in getting it to seat on top but was not sure and didn’t want to tear it off trying.


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[Voodude]

Definitely we went through the same. The full flap was on the body and curled.right back in. I wasnt sure about the string ends did, but i agree with you. The original seal didnt have it, but thought may be meant to tear off after install. I just left it to guide water away.

Did you trim and taper the ends? The body sheet metal curved in and the seal didnt really seat well. Looked at the original seal and sort of sat with a gap not holding on. I didnt trim down because in other pics the non oem stuff didnt have the same amount of metal molded into it. May just add silicone to ends. Just figure that 1/4" is enough for water to seep in. Paranoid after that rain water that ended up inside.

 

[east302]

I didn’t trim it on the ends, but it didn’t seat very well there, either. It was the GM weatherstripping.

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Water, with the flap in, lands directly on the bubble gasket which I doubt was the intention as the top gasket then does not seem to serve any purpose. I’ll try again to get mine to stay out...just had a hell of a time with it and gave up.

Mine did not leak from there, but I think it contributed. Mine (98 two door) leaked from the corner where the tailgate met the lift gate. These aren’t my photos of my truck, but show the same gap that I had. The outside trim panel is removed to show the gap.

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[Voodude]

Youre right might be more to this. Pics you found were great and showed buildup of water, dirt and time. From all the shots taken they was more dirt and water trails than what i found

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accumulated on my 96 Tahoe after 22 years (original owner). After clean up, no rust or bubbles started. Clean shiny paint only.

So I took another pic with old and new install for perspective. Lined up side by side the OEM seal is clean cut in full length didnt have the string and is flush with the tailgate. The 3rd party is flush with the string and connected. Slight round edge from string. Thinking the string is part of maufacturing and not trimmed of.

See what you think. We are forcasted for rain later today through Tues. Lol I'm tempted to put blue masking tape on the ends to cover.

 

[FA31]

Wish I knew the conclusion to this discussion!

 

[east302]

Me, too, lol.

I never could figure out why mine has the gap between the tailgate and liftglass, but am leaning toward a flaky robot on the factory floor.

I did get the flap to sit on top of the liftglass, though. Took quite a bit of work and ending up tearing. Ideally, you’d pull the liftglass off (loosen the hinges), seat the gasket and somehow hold it in place while tightening up the hinges. I have no clue how they did it in Detroit, but it seems too complicated to not have a simple solution.


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[bigfutz]

I have a gap between the glass and weatherstripping on the passenger side of my rear liftgate glass (95 Tahoe 2 door). I’m attributing it to a loose hinge. I can’t figure out how that hinge is attached to the window frame. All I see is some flat circles, but they don’t have any sort of head that would allow you to unscrew them. Are those covers that pop off or what? I don’t want to start prying until I know what I’m dealing with.