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Hello everyone,
I live in a place where yearly check-ups are mandatory. After replacing a ball joint (which was great fun..) my reliable POS is legal for another year. With all other issues taken care of I though things should be good. After the successful inspection however the mechanic did point out to me that there is one rust patch on the left rear that would likely become a problem next year.
The vehicle in this case is a 1997 Mitsubishi Colt/Lancer/Mirage, the small 3 door hatchback. Its (click) at about 165 000 miles right now, some 40k of those by me over the past 2 years which hasn’t been ideal but thats another story. In that time it hasn’t missed a beat, except that one day I neglected something I know I shouldn’t postpone.. Something else to keep in mind is that is got a dent in every body panel except those you can see in the picture. Thats how I bought it and thats why it was cheap. If I were to sell it right now, it would be worth around 300,-. But I must admit i’d pay a bit more to keep it going, its been good to me.
I would however like to see this car live on with me past the next year (in which I will be driving less then 10K per year) so I decided today as a good time to get a proper look at the problem (somehow I guess I never paid much attention to the rear of the vehicle). What I found is the following:
[IMG]http://i.imgur.com/hB7yCbo.jpg[/IMG]
What I thought i’d do (and in part have done) is the following:
– Steel wire brush / screw driver, if parts of it come loose I doubt they still served any structural purpose. Just trapping moisture in the cavities. On the flanged side, towards the wheel, a layer of the original undercoating was remaining. This has been removed. The side of the ‘beam’, above the exhaust (sort of) isn’t damaged.
– Rust ‘neutraliser’. To remove / kill as much of the nasty brown stuff as possible. (in the picture its wet from driving trough the rain still, it doesn’t look quite that terrible when dry). The product I picked up today is a gel based solution from ‘rustyco’.
– Several (thin) coatings of zinc spray (because I have that and thing it should seal up nicely)
– Tectyl/bitumen undercoating to keep the moisture, salt and what have you away from the weak spots.
But I’m very much open to suggestions on this, this repair should last for.. lets aim for 2 years, but at the very least one year without welding..
Thanks,
Rob
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Oke, the weather was good yesterday evening and today so I got around to applying the rust curing solution again this morning, I guess that cleared things up a bit, it became more grey with some light brown in places. Not sure if it was supposed to eat away all the brown or that this has just stopped it from going further. Haven’t taken a picture of this unfortunately.
After cleaning it up, some sanding where I could and again degreasing it before I applied 2-3 thin coats of zinc spray (motip). Says its fully cured in 2 hours, so after 3 I applied 2 more coats.
[IMG]http://i.imgur.com/PLDWAlp.jpg[/IMG]
Then some 3 hours later I’ve degreased the surface again, the zinc didn’t seem to come off and stick to my rag. That seemed like a good sign. Put the tectyl bodysafe wax on there in 3-4 thin(ish) layers, with several minutes in between as it recommends.
Haven’t stuck my camera under there yet, I’ll go take a picture in a few hours.
I guess time will tell how good/bad this works.. after the winter I’ll probably have some idea if this is going to last.
If anyone has had similar issues I’d like to know how you solved it, and if you think this is going to work for me. I know this bodyshop forum isn’t the busiest place on the board (not even sure if this goes under ‘bodywork’ at all) but I doubt I’m the first guy here with such issues.;)
And here is how it looks now.
[IMG]http://i.imgur.com/IpNss4B.jpg[/IMG]
On the positive.. it looks a lot less shocking. Above the flange from the exhaust system (in the picture, in real life its a bit further forwards..) is a piece of the original undercoating Mitsubishi has put on there, that makes the rust spot look deeper then it actually is. I probably should have removed more material, looking back at it now.
Either way this is all I got time for, for a while. I’ll have a proper look in a month or so, clean it off a bit and see how the paint is holding on and if any more material has come loose etc. Until then tips/tricks/links/comments are still welcome.
That looks 100% better than what you started out with. You don’t really know what you are working with until you get the wire brush or grinder out and start breaking up the rust.
I had some time and the weather was good, so I had another go at this today..
Some pictures on this page: http://imgur.com/a/weHMJ
A lot more material came off, on the side I found a tiny hole, and the remaining part of that top layer forms a nice crack for moisture to get up in to. In the last picture you can see the remains of one of the spot welds.
Spend several hours with my dremel and wire wheel (in a drill) getting everything as clean as I could.
Picked up some sort of expoy spray that is supposed to cure rust and form a base layer of paint, first layer is going to dry over night. Several more tomorrow, and then several layers of bitumen undercoating. Already injected a liberal amount in to the beam last time trough every hole I could find.
Either way I must conclude I can’t 100% stop this, I’m just going to have to wait and see how this holds up.
I’ll add some pictures of the finished result tomorrow.
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