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Nobody noticed there are two Big Gaps between the hood cover and headlamp?

167K views 477 replies 140 participants last post by  onejeepster 
#1 ·
I did a car wash in a gas station yesterday, happen to find out that water were blow all over inside the engine compartment after wash by the drying blower. I checked all the hood insulation between the cover and the car body. This gap is what cause it, I think. I can't understand why new Rav4 was designed in this way?
 
#418 · (Edited)
Good to know about the extra gaskets.
My 2020gas Lim engine bay was very dirty for same miles driven as other vehicles. The front side of the airfilter box was collecting dirt, gave it a wash down today.

I went looking for the parts listed around post #10, it seems Toyota made a change to these:
81117-42831
81157-42831

Last digit went from 0 to 1
 
#419 ·
In my opinion, Toyota intentionally left that gap unsealed. The hood gap over the headlights, while unsightly... appears to function for heat extraction. If you hold your hand across the gap area after driving the vehicle, the heat escaping through the gap from the engine bay will be detectable. Significant heat extraction is not detectable elsewhere, not to the rear of the hood, the front grills or under the vehicle due to the aero cladding that covers most of the engine bay. In my experience, water intrusion through the gaps due to rain or car washing has been minimal.
 
#427 ·
Installed them today.
My method:
dry fit the pieces, read 1-2-3 here, dry fit, then go.

1) damp cloth (hot water), wipe the lens area clean.
2) a drop or two rubbing alcohol on dry rag, just wipe the area clean, wave hands (wind) to evap the alcohol. Wait 1min.
3) install rear to front, there's an obvious triangle cut on end-edge of rubber, and a slight triangle sticking up from the lens, align rubber cut into the little lens triangle (butt up to), move slowly, try not to pull-stretch as you go otherwise it will land long on the far end.

Some arguments in this thread that say Hybrids have them but ICE do not. But the benefits mentioned for ICE not to having them are not benefits Hybrids should have? Would be good to get an official statement from Toyota.

I installed them, hopefully it cuts down on the dirt entering engine bay.
 
#428 · (Edited)
I installed those oem toyota weatherstrips a week or so ago. They're a little pricey now. I paid $18 each from mcgeorge toyota, msrp is $27, and your local dealer could charge even more. Even after installing those, there's still about a 4" gap farther up the hood, which I've seen mentioned in this thread or another thread on this topic.

I decided to seal up that small gap today, and the stuff I used seems pretty good quality, and could be an alternative to the oem toyota seals which have gone up in price. $1.55 a foot and free shipping, height and width are basically the same as the oem toyota seals. Automotive RV Marine Exterior Hollow D Rubber Door Hatch Weather Strip w/ Seal (original link was broken, fixed now)
There wasn't really a good sealing surface behind the headlights, so I attached it to the hood. oem toyota seals are 17" long, if you want to cover the extra gap that I did today, you'll need 23" for each side.

Living in Maine I'm not too worried about trapping heat, engine compartment should be able to withstand the heat produced.
Automotive parking light Hood Automotive tire Automotive lighting Motor vehicle
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#442 ·
Honestly I've popped the hood immediately after getting home and the engine didn't seem abnormally hot at all (With the headlight seals, and gap behind them sealed. Today I was actually surprised by just how cool it was). It's been in like the 70's and 80's here lately for reference. I think we need to remember that a lot of cool air comes in through the front bumper, in addition to the ac fan and cooling fan pulling outside air in. The big metal hood kind of acting like a heatsink too.

Now, I do think there is a bit of heatsoak after you shut the engine off, but I'm not concerned about that all.
 
#443 ·
If the vehicle is moving a lot, the bay stays cool.

After a hwy drive, let it idle in driveway for 30min, then see how hot the bay is.

Without airflow, whatever heat the bay has, goes up, and can in fact make the temps rise of everything in the bay.

I too don't think "heatsoak" is of any issue for Rav4 (well, it can be in some vehicles). My Lexus v8 has a big plastic cover over the top of the engine. Why trap heat? Guessing Toyota sees no issue in that, and, having a cover looks better when you open the hood. Caveat, heatsoak can be an issue in some cases. My Lexus alternator is fairly close to exhaust header pipe, and w/o airflow from driving the radiant heat from the pipe does raise temp of the alternator.

I also do not think Toyota takes a lot of time experimenting with high-production low-cost vehicles. They build to meet Govt requirements of the various markets their vehicles are sold in. Careful balance between regulations, costs, and features. The Lexus brand however seems to be more refined.
 
#452 ·
@Tazio Nuvolari what's your take on the 22's having the seals and the 21's not having the seals? My guess it has zero to do with engineering and all about supply. To my untrained eyes, I don't notice any engineering changes in the engine bays between model years of the hybrids. One thing I can say is the strips don't seem to make any difference with the amount of dust that works its way in.
 
#454 ·
If you have struggled through all the early posts in this very long thread you will see we have been arguing (sometimes angrily) about this for years. As JFox562 says in post 453 above there have been many theories why some 5th gen RAVs had the rubber weatherstrips and others did not. I wasted way too much time researching Eastern European 5th gen Ravs and found basically that Toyota seemed to install the weatherstrips randomly in a haphazard manner. I think I found that even some ICE models in Russia had them OEM stock and others in Poland did not. I don't care anymore. It really does not matter. Personally, I very much like the rubber weatherstrips. They have worked to keep water out of my engine compartment which was my main concern inn the Pacific Northwest. I have not noticed any dust intrusion either.
 
#453 ·
I have shared a few theroies of my own but have no proof

Such as
  • There have been pictures posted where the seals were installed at the factory when the headlight washer option was installed. Non-North American RAV4 versions
  • Other cases, when the projector headlights are part of the trim, the seals are installed by default.
  • At one time it would seem, which did not fully pan out, was they were installed by default for hybrids only.
Mine did not come with them on my 2019 but neither did the under hood insulation pad so cost saving might actually be the reason. Needless to say, I purchased both and installed them myself.
 
#462 ·
Recently bought a 2023 Prime XSE (assembled in Japan) and there are no headlight seals. The headlights have a definite area molded into the top that follows the contour of the hood. While it looks like a perfect spot for a gasket, there is also relatively high wall at the back of the headlight that would stop water from going directly into the engine bay. The car has been driven in the rain a few times now and there's no evidence of water intrusion.
 

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#468 ·
One of the headlight seals was delivered and I don't like how the seal is supposed to sit further back so you still see a big gap between the headlight and the fender. I wish they were an inch or so longer so they could be mounted further outward and would fill in that gap... might have to look around and see if there's something else that would work as well and look better.
 
#473 ·
My 2019 Rav4 LE suffered from the same headlight gap.

I hated how it looked as well as letting water/dirt into the engine bay so I installed a LED strip light that is working out in place of a gasket. Added benefit is it provided additional light that I have wired to turn on when the vehicle is started.

Grille Automotive lighting Vehicle Hood Automotive tire
 
#475 ·
My 2019 Rav4 LE suffered from the same headlight gap.

I hated how it looked as well as letting water/dirt into the engine bay so I installed a LED strip light that is working out in place of a gasket. Added benefit is it provided additional light that I have wired to turn on when the vehicle is started.

View attachment 198759
Can you tell me what brad of bug screen you have? Any other pics with it?
 
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