MOTORING with Ralph Magunje: Motor vehicle rust prevention tips

For those of us who buy used or own older cars, it is important to learn how to: find rust; keep it from starting; and address it once it has started. In order to detect rust on an unfamiliar car or combat it on your own vehicle, one needs to understand how rust usually starts and where it is most likely to emerge. And please do not believe all salespersons as the Corrosion Doctors keep telling you here:

How Rust Starts

The way rust usually begins is through the chips and nicks you receive from the pebbles and stones that pepper your car through daily driving. With a small nick exposing bare metal in an unnoticeable location, it’s just a matter of time until rust forms. Left unchecked long enough it will eat its way through to the other side. When this happens you have problems because once a rust hole starts it can not be stopped. It can only be slowed down.

Where to look for Rust
The most likely areas to check for rust would be in and around the wheel wells and on the fenders immediately behind the tyres. These are the war zones where your tyres will kick up stones and chip the paint. The front of your car can also catch flying stones from other cars, making this a problem area as well.

If you are looking at a used car for sale, use a flashlight to look underneath the car behind the front and rear tyres on both sides. Of course, before you do this make sure the car is parked on a level surface in park/gear and the emergency brake engaged! If it’s on a slope, put blocks under the wheels for added safety. Shine your light on the inside of the fenders and wheel wells. Check for excess body filler, which from this side will look like hardened putty all globbed up. In areas where you don’t have a clear view, use your fingers as your eyes and feel around. Do you feel globs of hardened putty under there? If so you’re looking at a likely rust repair job.

Now you can use the sound test to decipher how far up body the filler goes. Above the suspected area, tap lightly on the car’s body with your knuckles. You should hear a tiny metal sound. Continue tapping and move slowly down to the area in question. Does the sound change from tinny to solid and dense? Where the sound changes is where the filler starts.
Once you have detected a rust repair job you may want to stop your inspection and find a rust-free car because eventually the rust will come bubbling back up through the paint. The car may look great now, but if it looks like swiss cheese in a year, you’ll be the loser in this deal.

Another word to the wise for the used car buyer: Avoid cars with fresh paint. Think about it. No one paints a car just because the colour has faded a little. It was painted because it was either in an accident or it had a rust problem or worse yet — both! A body man can hide a lot of sin with paint and body filler. Be wary.
Other rust-prone places to check when buying a car would be the exterior flooring under the driver’s and passenger’s seats, the interior flooring underneath the carpeting/ matting, under the carpeting/matting in the trunk, and around the engine compartment. Use your flashlight, your eyes and your fingers!

How to Keep Rust from Starting
The key to keeping a rust-free car is by stopping rust before it can start. Or at least address it before it eats its way to the other side. Because bare metal will oxidize and painted surfaces won’t, you only need to protect your car from the elements to keep rust a bay.

You should maintain your car’s body just like everything else. This means a periodic checking of the most common areas where rust might rear its ugly head.
Keep some touch-up paint on hand and periodically go over your entire car’s painted exterior with fine tooth comb. Look for chips and nicks in the paint. If you find a chip where surface rust has already weaselled its way in, use sand paper (220 grade or finer) and carefully sand it down to bare metal. Tiny nicks will be a challenge. Wrap the sand paper around the tip of a small screw driver and try not to mar the surrounding painted surface.

Clean the dirt from the chips with a rag dampened with mineral spirits and let dry. Using a touch-up brush, dab a little paint on the nick, just enough to fill in the gap. There’s no need to coat the surrounding painted surface. Otherwise it will just make your touch up more noticeable. Do it right and your nick practically becomes invisible. If you botch up your first try just wipe it off with your dampened rag, let dry, and start over.

Periodical washing of your car’s undercarriage is also a good way to protect your car from corrosion. Visit your manual car wash on a monthly basis and spray the underside of your car and inside the wheel wells too. A build up of dirt can hold moisture against your car’s undercarriage and promote rust. Keeping it clean under there will allow surfaces to dry quicker making it less susceptible to oxidation.

Whether you are in the market for a used car or just trying to maintain your current set of wheels, practise of the following steps can keep rust from eating away your car as well as your pocket book.

Tips

Prevent rust by keeping the underside of your car clean also. Place a lawn sprinkler under your car and turn on full blast. Move occasionally so it will reach all areas. This is a good way to remove all salt and road grime

l If you chip the paint on your car, clean promptly and apply touch-up paint or clear nail polish to the area.
l If the carpet in your vehicle is subjected to a lot of salty water over the winter, rust could be forming where you can’t even see it, underneath the carpet. A good rug shampoo, either a do-it-yourself project or professionally done, will help remove the salt from the carpet fibres. Be sure to clean the upholstery too.