# Mildew smell



## jmjs34 (Dec 30, 2020)

Hello all, I'm looking for some help in tracking down a mildew smell in my wife's 2015 Rogue. It started fairly suddenly a couple days ago. It had been kind of rainy, but I didn't notice any wetness in the car at the time. When I was checking the interior after a day or two of the smell, I did notice there was standing water in the spare tire well in the trunk. The car is parked on a driveway with a pitch, so this is the lowest point in the inside of the car. So again, other than that puddle, I haven't seen any signs of water leaking from anywhere in the interior (door/window/sun roof seals, etc), and when the AC runs, the smell dissipates.

We've had the car for 5 years and it is very clean inside (my wife is a bit of a clean freak). I checked the forward sun roof drains and water very easily flows out behind the front wheels. The improvement of the smell with the AC running potentially narrows down some heating/AC causes. Anyone ever have similar issues or have any thoughts in general? Thank you all.


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## VStar650CL (Nov 12, 2020)

If it's normally parked nose-up, the front drains won't do anything. You need to pitch up the front end and check the rear drains. Since most clogs are an amalgam of dirt and tree sap, the drains that clog are always the ones that do the most work. In an uphill parking space, that's the rears. Unfortunately, if they are clogged, on a gen2 Rogue there's no easy way to clean them out. The lower cargo room panels are a complete pain to remove, so accessing the hoses from the bottom as you would on a sedan is as much work as partially dropping the headliner. You can try snaking some grass trimmer line in there with the roof open, but the drain holes are angled so finding them won't be easy.


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## jmjs34 (Dec 30, 2020)

That all makes sense, I appreciate the reply. I'll try to clean those out and go from there. Thanks.


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## VStar650CL (Nov 12, 2020)

You're most welcome! Happy New Year!


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