04 windshield wiper fluid leak

My 04 has a leak in the wiper fluid system, after running the wipers with fluid, the reservoir leaks and goes bone dry. The rear window never receives any fluid but the windshield receives its normal amount with no noticeable drop in pressure.

Here's the weird part, there are no visible signs of a leak. I poured 3 liters of water and watched it all drain, but there was no water underneath the car. My car is sitting on a slight decline in the garage with the nose slightly higher than the rear of the car.

I pulled the reservoir out and it is not cracked, the leak appears to be somewhere else and it seems to be collecting. I even moved the car and didn't see a puddle of water.

Any ideas what might be happening or where I can look to find anything? I haven't taken it to the dealer and would prefer not to....

Tyler

 

Thanks for the suggestions, I found where the water is going. It is pooling at the feet of the rear passenger side of the car. I ran the rear wipers with it quiet enough that I could hear the water running inside the car. The sound seemed to come out of the vent for the hi-voltage battery so that makes me wonder if the water is running down that pillar. However, since the reservoir drains quickly I suspect that the break is below the reservoirs level so I'd guess that the line runs under the car on the inside somewhere.

I've got a lot of water to suck up out of the carpet. I don't know the inside well enough to know how to take the seat and carpet out so if anyone knows of a good tutorial I'd love to see it.

I'm contemplating clamping off the line to the rear window and not fixing the broken line (unless it's something I can get to). I'm not really thrilled with the idea of paying the dealer to fix this unless there's a good chance some electronics are in jeopardy from this water pool. Thoughts? This is first real problem this car has had in my 7 years of ownership, guess my good fortune had to end sometime.

Now off to run my carpet shampooer to get the water out.... This has ruined a pretty good day.
Tyler

 

I was sucking out the water when I realized the space under the carpet was like a water bed so I popped the panels off and pulled up a piece of carpet and found 1.5 inches of water. Stupid me for trying to find the leak.

Stupidity aside, I found a spot where I think the leak originated from and it seems to be from a loose junction between two water lines (see the black part of the water line at the bottom right corner of the photo). There was water visible on the cables in the photo, starting on the black cable below the yellow plug. Whatever the thick black cable is was also wet (since it's thick and black, I'm guessing it's a bad one to be wet especially headed towards the batter).

So it may be a simple repair but it will take some time to dry out while I pray nothing is damaged.

 

I can't either. I pushed the hose in tighter and got water on the hatch window. I take some comfort knowing I didn't cause this, but I feel stupid for using as much water as I did looking for a leak. I sucked up as much water as I can and have drained the floor board (Toyota did put in some drain plugs in just the right spots). I'll let it dry for a few days while I go buy a new coupling.

Well now we know that the fluid line runs down the passenger side before going up to the hatch.

 

It came apart in August, so I guess 10 years was enough to cause the rubber to degrade so it wouldn't hold a seal anymore. There are no visible cracks in the coupling so it must have just worn out over time.