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Hi had a leaking boot for ages now on the e21,I bought a new seal and fitted it with a mate and it still leaked so added a bit of sealant which reduced the leak but still let's water in.what am I doing wrong?
I saw a picture of someone's bronze coloured e21,
they were fitting a seal and it looked as though they fitted it different or had a different type of seal,
the way mine is fitted is with the pointed edge facing up toward the boot lid and the rubber gully in the rain tray drain around the edge,could anyone take a pic of there seal fitted for me.im taking the seal off again after work to try and stop it leaking.it leaks along the rear window and top edges,ive put a camera in there and poured water through when the boot is shut so I know this is where it's coming from and not through the light seals

Sounds like it's fitted correctly, but please note you need to glue it in, pretty much covering the entire rain tray otherwise water will pass underneath the seal, or stay there and cause rust. So it requires some patience but then it should be water tight for years to come. Important cause for leaks are the edges, if these are torn water will slip through.

If that's all fine, could it be your boot lid sits too high leaving room between the top of the seal and the boot lid?

I've decided to take it of scrape all the old sealant out and I've got some no nails waterproof stuff I'm going to use and then clamp the corners down with c clamps also hopefully fit it a bit better so the high part is higher,i pushed the sides in to the gutters on the sides yesterday and slammed the boot and it sounded a lot more solid and didn't hear such a boot echo which makes me believe my atempts will work... He says! haha

Fingers crossed then!

Still leaking!! Doin my head in!!
A small bit down left but It's down the drivers side top corner now,
gonna wack some more sealant on it and try and move the lip up more if that doesn't work then not sure what to do heard someone say they saw a e28 with a extra weather strip in the tray of the original one

Are you certain it's getting past the boot seal? My rear screen leaks, and water is just visible when looking at the base of the rear screen, between the parcel shelf and the seal. It then seems to work it's way through the seams in the panelwork and drip on to the inner wheel arch in the boot. It's HIGH on my fix list!

taillight rubbers also leak when getting old.

Hmm il check for the screen I'm gonna put a camera in there tomorrow and see where it's coming from,want a dry boot lol

When you close the boot there is a large crack of light between the lid and seal at the back in the middle,I'd there a way to adjust the lid to make it shut down more?

As the rear drain tray is known to have rust issues, perhaps it was replaced at some point and not welded correctly? Either that or the trunk lid will be the cause of course. I can imagine a jack in the boot and a few blocks of wood may help, literally straighten things out. Or perhaps people have a less drastic option?

So bit of a eventful afternoon.
after checking the boot this morning found it had a fair amount of rain in the spare wheel well,
I did a bit of banging on the rear seal tray and bit of adjusting the lock and added a stick on seal to the boot lid,
it seems to have sealed a bit better and I'm quite hopeful for good results.
also checked the places suggested,around the lights was fine with no real leaking,
but have found a couple of places where water pass peeing through,one around the filler neck,the water must be going into the filler flap and the seal has bin cut up loads to make it easier to fit I presume,so have ordered one from BMW at £13 and for the moment put some sealant around the old seal hopefully this will slow down the water.also as suggested before,
Where the window seal joins in the bottom right there is a slight leak that runs down the inner wing,
so I will put a few squirts of black sealant into the seal just to block this little trickle,hopefully getting on top of the thirsty boot haha il keep you posted as to how it goes tomorrow,thanks for your patience with all this boot talk.
The few people I know who have a e21 has just put up with it and I need my boot relatively dry haha

i think you can adjust the gap at the back edge by winding in the little rubber bungs at each end

Can anyone think of a reason why one couldn't use a generic seal for the boot, like this one:



That would allow water to run off freely and keep the drain tray clean - and stop the rust from happening again.

Ehm the metal rim not being high enough to make it stick properly?

Tried it?

Surely a bead of sealant inside the seal should hold it in place?

I have a fresh OEM one from W&N but just occurred to me this worth trying out..