I did mine yesterday and it literally takes ten minutes...if you have small hands. lol. If you lay on the floor of your drivers side carpet, you can actually look up with a flashlight under the dash and see where the drain plug goes into the firewall. It is literally right at the same height as the Tachometer and right behind it. You have to squeeze a few fingers up there to get at it...once you pull it out of the firewall you need to (with one hand) pull off the end "nipple"....that is where you will look into that piece and see the dreaded "X"....which you simply cut out and make it hollow...then have fun putting it back on! The hardest part for me was getting the plug to seal properly against the firewall...because the firewall padding gets in the way of the seal. I had to actually remove the left small panel of the side of the dash and reach into the little hole they have there for you. I actually had to cut that hole a little bigger (I used wire cutters...who cares...the panel covers it anyway when you put it back on!). After five minutes of struggling I finally heard the pop noise of the ridge of the plug seating into the firewall firmly....and make sure its in there all the way or your fix will be irrelevant! The other side (passenger side) is way easier...again, with small hands. I can help out all people in or near Connecticut if you need a hand!

 

Mr. Broken Halo.....your article is a Godsend!
I just fixed my front tubes. I spent a half a day taking apart places where the tubes were not, like the inner fenderwells. But I also had a cup or so of mud & leaves built up at the back side which needed to be hosed out so it was a good thing after all.

With your piece, I got it done in about 1 hour. Passenger side more of a pain than the driver's side (didn't expect that, started on the pass side.)

I used a 3/8 drill to open up the nipples which I probably could have done up under the dash if the tubes weren't full of water. I would suggest having a large soda cup ready when the nipple is pulled from the firewall as a flood comes out which I had to let run on the carpet as there was no stopping it then.

Thanks again. I don't think I would ever have found the tube exits without your help.

 

Those x slits are actually designed into our trucks for a reason. They keep water from shooting back out of the top of the sunroof drains when fording through deep water.

Just something to keep in mind if you later want to test the H3's 16" fording depth rating.

 

First of all, Thank you so much for sharing this information...
I tried to follow the instructions, but I am kinda stuck as I couldn't figure it out how to open instrument and side trim panels...
I'll really appreciate if someone can guide me on that...
Pics are always nice...

 

First whomever designed a leaking sunroof should be fired. Knowing to place drain tubes is knowing you did something wrong in my book! If your tubes are not entirely clogged like mine, I brought some 1/8" tubing and ran it down until I reached the block, hooked up my air nozzle to the hose and blew it a few times. I definitely heard something free up and an immediate rush of air flowing into the cowl area. This might be a simple fix and a periodic routine maintenance add to your list. Hope this helps, if not there is always the long method of rip apart.

 

Be careful with that air blast.
You can easily blow the drain tube off the fitting. Then you gotta pull the headliner to reattach it.

 

While you're in there, you can fasten them to the fitting with a zip tie when reattaching them to keep it from coming loose down the road. Might have been suggested already...

 

I don't think mine was clogged as much as some others. I think I had some issues with sand from being on the beach so the block was enough to fill the Chanel but easily was cleared. I guess I should has said in my post not to force the hose or try a 200# blast of air.....I had about 70# in a low volume on board compressor, I didn't even want to try using my shop compressor for the same reason. I still think this is the first **** poor design outside of the hood vent recall. Only two problems I have ever had with my alpha.

 

I think we discovered at least one reason for the "X flaps" in the drain. Driving in rainy weather at about 75mph, we can now hear a gurgling sound coming from the front corners of the sun roof. Seems that air pressure builds up at the firewall drain area at high speed & blows back up the tubes into the sunroof drain channel. That's probably why the flaps were in the rubber piece.
Hey, I'll take a little gurgle to water falling in my lap any day.

 

Haven't noticed any negatives on the mod yet in the year since I've done it.

I noticed the rubber tubing at the sunroof nipple fitting has a groove molded into the rubber likely designed to be fastened with some sort of clamp or tie. at some point in production this step must have been deleted??