This should help all of you unfortunate enough to own a 97 wrangler like me.
I have gone through post after post after post trying to uncover the source of the water leak under my dash. After sealing up the intake for the HVAC in the cowl, sealing up any seams that may have been leaking, folding the windshield down and checking the seal around the windshield, and the seal between the windshield and the cowl, and also checking every friggin hole in the firewall, and finally checking all the seals at the front of my soft top,-- I HAVE FOUND THE CULPRIT.
Every time I would take the cowl cover off, I would set it aside and go about looking for a leak. I would run water down from the bottom of the windshield, check and find no leak. Run water at the top of the windshield,at the top seal, and check for leak. yada yada yada. Everytime- NO LEAK. The only time I would get a leak was in hard rainstorms.
Finally today I went to take one more look and while standing there holding the cowl in my hand I saw the black plastic grate thats on the underside of the cowl. Took a look and didn't see any screw holes to hold it in place. Took a closer look and VIOLA!!! The black plastic is glued to the cowl from underneath. The problem was just that. Old brittle glue that was holding around the entire perimeter of the cowl except for one corner. Guess which corner it was!
Apparently when it would rain the water would build up on the plastic on the passenger side cowl vent, and directly below that corner with the worn out glue, you got it, the intake for the hvac.
So for anybody with a 97 wrangler, check on that, glue it up, and you should be good.
