Long, sad story of half-assery...I really do need advice

[Konish]

Fellas,

LONG story.

 

Let me preface by saying that I'm working in a pretty austere environment. Parking lot, gets dark by 5:00 pm, temps from 50-40s and rain off and on during this time of year.

 

Also, I'm in Japan. Now, that isn't an issue except that many products available in the US are 1) not available here, 2) ungodly expensive ($13 for a regular can of spray paint) or 3) cannot be shipped here via USPS. With some fore-thought and/or willingness ot pay a bit more for some stuff, most of these issues can be resolved.

 

Here's my woe of half-assery..guilty as charged.

 

Having discovered this (the car does need weather stripping, which is what contributed to the rust):

 

and this:

 

I ended up pulling out my seats, console and eventually the tunnel upholstery and factory sound deadening material...form here on out referred to as tar paper.

 

Now the intent was just to take care of the bit you see under the pax side seat, but I got curious...and put my putty knife under the pax side foot well tar paper and it popped right up.

 

Because that crap is overlapped in about 2-3 places along the tunnel and floor, I noticed the tunnel tar paper also pulled away extremely easy. My thought was that it was probably pushed away from the metal by rust. Essentially I was right because there was trace rust on everything but I think mostly the glue dried up and got brittle. This seemingly innocent discovery set off a chain of events I don't think I was totally prepared for, thus the half-assery that ensued.

 

Here's what a bag of almost 40 year old sound deadening looks like

 

 

Anyway, out came the scouring tools and chemicals (phosphoric acid)...with no real end-state other than to coat the floor with *something* I proceeded to do this:

 

 

and this:

 

 

The green on the driver seat floorboard was a previous attempt in removing a small amount of scale rust...I knew better than to look under the seats...argh!

 

After getting to this stage, I went out and bought Krylon Rust Tough Prime Galvanizing Primer and Rust Tough Enamel

 

http://www.krylon.com/products/rust_tough_prime_galvanizing_primer/

http://www.krylon.com/products/rust_tough_rust_preventative_enamel/

 

and the PO was kind enough to give me a small can of POR 15.

 

Some more info. After the initial scouring, I did a phos acid wash on the metal...and it worked as advertised. It turned the embedded rust black and left a dull whitish film. But it also brought out, sticky stains in the metal where the glue was left, so I had wire brush the entire surface AGAIN down to bare metal.

 

Once that was done, I decided (and here is where I could kick myself) to do a fresh water wash-down to get rid of any remaining acid and clean all the scouring tool crap and trash out of the car. About 2 minutes after that I got flash rust ALL OVER the floors and tunnel. No pics, sorry. It was so slight that it could only be brought up with a paper towel and brake cleaner.

 

I had to act, but before I committed to anything, I did some research. POR 15 seemed pretty picky about prep, and since I was afraid it would peel I decided to take the primer/enamel route. So on with a coat of primer and overnight to dry.

 

Here is the second reason I could kick myself. Forecast called for 0 chance of rain so I left the windows down about an inch on both windows..and water got on top of the primer. About a cup in the pax side and an ounce in the driver foot well. This next part scares me a bit. On the pax side where the standing water was, there was rust on top of the primer. The rust looked like a few small grains of rusty sand were randomly scattered...not much though.

 

Thing is, the rust came up with a fingernail...like it was something that that got caught on top of the primer and rusted. I sanded (not as thoroughly as I would have liked) the rusty stains down and re-primered. After all that, I shot it with some of the Krylon enamel and it stuck very well to the primer.

 

Results:

 

 

So, finally, here are my questions.

 

1. Did I just cause a bigger problem down the road by shooting the primer over the flash rust? The Krylon website says the galvanizing primer can be shot over rust (not scaly rust, though) which is why I thought it'd be okay. However I'm not so sure with the rust I found on top of the primer after the water intrusion. In other words, is rust going to rage unchecked under a fresh coat of primer and enamel? I'm guessing that since it's encapsulated of a kind, it *should* be okay(?)

 

2. If so, will it manifest itself by bubbling and peeling in the paint quick enough that I can get to it before it does any huge damage?

 

3. Should I just go ahead and order some zero rust and rust prep and just start over by stripping the entire cockpit and try again?

 

I really only need a year (maybe up to three) before I can blow this thing apart and really restore it and I would *hate* to have it down again (due to time and circumstances) to take care of the problem but will if this is a horror story in the making (ooops, too late)

[cockerstar]

Looks like you've done a fine job at preserving your solid looking floors from the inside

[zgeezer]

Fellas,

LONG story.

 

Let me preface by saying that I'm working in a pretty austere environment. Parking lot, gets dark by 5:00 pm, temps from 50-40s and rain off and on during this time of year.

 

Also, I'm in Japan. Now, that isn't an issue except that many products available in the US are 1) not available here, 2) ungodly expensive ($13 for a regular can of spray paint) or 3) cannot be shipped here via USPS. With some fore-thought and/or willingness ot pay a bit more for some stuff, most of these issues can be resolved.

 

Here's my woe of half-assery..guilty as charged.

 

Having discovered this (the car does need weather stripping, which is what contributed to the rust):

 

and this:

 

I ended up pulling out my seats, console and eventually the tunnel upholstery and factory sound deadening material...form here on out referred to as tar paper.

 

Now the intent was just to take care of the bit you see under the pax side seat, but I got curious...and put my putty knife under the pax side foot well tar paper and it popped right up.

 

Because that crap is overlapped in about 2-3 places along the tunnel and floor, I noticed the tunnel tar paper also pulled away extremely easy. My thought was that it was probably pushed away from the metal by rust. Essentially I was right because there was trace rust on everything but I think mostly the glue dried up and got brittle. This seemingly innocent discovery set off a chain of events I don't think I was totally prepared for, thus the half-assery that ensued.

 

Here's what a bag of almost 40 year old sound deadening looks like

 

 

Anyway, out came the scouring tools and chemicals (phosphoric acid)...with no real end-state other than to coat the floor with *something* I proceeded to do this:

 

 

and this:

 

 

The green on the driver seat floorboard was a previous attempt in removing a small amount of scale rust...I knew better than to look under the seats...argh!

 

After getting to this stage, I went out and bought Krylon Rust Tough Prime Galvanizing Primer and Rust Tough Enamel

 

http://www.krylon.com/products/rust_tough_prime_galvanizing_primer/

http://www.krylon.com/products/rust_tough_rust_preventative_enamel/

 

and the PO was kind enough to give me a small can of POR 15.

 

Some more info. After the initial scouring, I did a phos acid wash on the metal...and it worked as advertised. It turned the embedded rust black and left a dull whitish film. But it also brought out, sticky stains in the metal where the glue was left, so I had wire brush the entire surface AGAIN down to bare metal.

 

Once that was done, I decided (and here is where I could kick myself) to do a fresh water wash-down to get rid of any remaining acid and clean all the scouring tool crap and trash out of the car. About 2 minutes after that I got flash rust ALL OVER the floors and tunnel. No pics, sorry. It was so slight that it could only be brought up with a paper towel and brake cleaner.

 

I had to act, but before I committed to anything, I did some research. POR 15 seemed pretty picky about prep, and since I was afraid it would peel I decided to take the primer/enamel route. So on with a coat of primer and overnight to dry.

 

Here is the second reason I could kick myself. Forecast called for 0 chance of rain so I left the windows down about an inch on both windows..and water got on top of the primer. About a cup in the pax side and an ounce in the driver foot well. This next part scares me a bit. On the pax side where the standing water was, there was rust on top of the primer. The rust looked like a few small grains of rusty sand were randomly scattered...not much though.

 

Thing is, the rust came up with a fingernail...like it was something that that got caught on top of the primer and rusted. I sanded (not as thoroughly as I would have liked) the rusty stains down and re-primered. After all that, I shot it with some of the Krylon enamel and it stuck very well to the primer.

 

Results:

 

 

So, finally, here are my questions.

 

1. Did I just cause a bigger problem down the road by shooting the primer over the flash rust? The Krylon website says the galvanizing primer can be shot over rust (not scaly rust, though) which is why I thought it'd be okay. However I'm not so sure with the rust I found on top of the primer after the water intrusion. In other words, is rust going to rage unchecked under a fresh coat of primer and enamel? I'm guessing that since it's encapsulated of a kind, it *should* be okay(?)

 

2. If so, will it manifest itself by bubbling and peeling in the paint quick enough that I can get to it before it does any huge damage?

 

3. Should I just go ahead and order some zero rust and rust prep and just start over by stripping the entire cockpit and try again?

 

I really only need a year (maybe up to three) before I can blow this thing apart and really restore it and I would *hate* to have it down again (due to time and circumstances) to take care of the problem but will if this is a horror story in the making (ooops, too late)

 

Don't beat yourself up. We all learn by doing. I think you'll be allright. If you are worried, the real cure would be to sand to metal and then lay on the POR15 and forget about rust. POR 15 adheres well to bare metal, to bare metal prepped with Phosphoric Acid, and to metal with flash or any rust that can't be metal brushed off. It also will cure in a wet climate. In fact it cures faster with high humidity than in a dry climate. It will cure in a rainstorm. There are a number of websites that discuss POR 15, if you are interested in redoing the interior.

 

g

[ktm]

POR 15 adheres well to bare metal, to bare metal prepped with Phosphoric Acid, and to metal with flash or any rust that can't be metal brushed off.

 

Eh, not really (to the part in bold). I've used POR15 quite a lot and the POR peeled off by hand very easily in areas where it was layed over bare, unetched, unrusted metal. You need to etch all the metal when using POR (per their instructions). Sanding it prior to etching will help with the bond.

[Konish]

Fellas,

Not to turn this into a POR 15 argument, but the two differing comments are exactly why I decided to not use POR. There were plenty of unprepared, dirty edges along the bare metal that I'm convinced it would have at least started to peel along the edge to finally migrate out into the

main panels.

 

To be clear, I'm not necessarily looking for opinions on what product to use if I decide to start all over (because if that's the case I'm going to use zero rust and rust prep)...I'm just wondering if I *should* be worried at all. I certainly don't want to make work for myself if I can get by with it until I have the time and location to restore this thing properlyrty. More to the point I was looking for real-world similar experiences that could help me focus on any possible issues etc. I guess I'm just going to monitor closely and make a decision then.

 

R/

Dustin

[icapture]

.

 

I sure am glad you decided to quote the entire first post...

[zgeezer]

I sure am glad you decided to quote the entire first post...

 

Well, Exactly my thoughts too.

 

G