What is the best way to treat surface rust on the floor pans? I just pulled the front half of my carpet out to clean it and my floor pans have alot of surface rust on them. They have a couple of pin holes in them also, but overall they are solid as a rock. Just the paint has worn off over the years allowing surface rust to set in. I want to do something about this now before I put the carpet back in so I don't have twice as much work to do down the road. Short of sand blasting it, what is the best way to remove the surface rust? Also the stuff they put over the seams in the body is loose and falling off in several places. What do I do about that? I'll post some pictures later.
Grind or sand off as much rust as possible then thoroughly clean the surface. Next apply some POR 15 let it dry and harden then paint over it. On the underside do the same except spray some rubberized undercoating instead of painting.
Found something I didn't notice earlyer when I took the carpet out, there appears to have been a second build sheet under the carpet! This is the first time the carpet has EVER been out of this car since it was built at the factory. Unfortunately what is left of the build sheet just crumbles when you touch it, but from the numbers and letters I can make out on it, it appears to just be an exact copy of the build sheet I have put up that was originally in the springs of the seat. Here's some pics. The driver's side is what really concerns me. Alot of what you see there is just 31 years worth of dirt but alot of it is rust to. It "feels" solid. I have decided tomarrow I am going to pull the back seat out and the back half of the carpet. I'm also going to pull the rear plastic peaces out. None of it has been out since the car was built at the factory and this car has had a somewhat intresting history. It'll be fun to see what I can find. It smells musty in the car now. Kinda like when you first walk into a really old house.
A 4" grinder with a wire cup brush will remove all the rust and seam sealer in a jiffy. Then coat with rust bullit or por. After that reseal your seams. Eastwood sells seam sealer along with any auto body supplier.
Dang, tough luck w/ the floor, good advice given however. My floor has NO rust at all still has some paint on it
jamie, you might want to find out why they "rusted". there had to be a source of water at some point. the pass. side could have been a "leaking heater core" at one time. the driver side in a non a/c car could be the "fresh air vent or cowl". some times there are pin holes at the base of the windshield. hope none of this is you. maybe the windows were left down in the rain once or twice . let us know what you find...frank...
Ohh, I could write a book about why it's rusted or why it should be rusted ALOT worse then it is. I think most of the rust is from the windshield. It leaks in 3 diffrent places along the top. It has also got rained in a coulpe of times since I have had it. Gotta love that Georgia weather where you go in the house to take a break and it's sunny outside and then 30 minutes later you come back out and it's a full blown thunder strom coming down. Also, the driver's side looks wet, but it's not water. It's brake fluid from the original master cylinder which I just replaced and it's doing a very effective job of removeing what little paint is left on that side. The cowl is completely solid. There isn't even any surface rust in the cowl from what I can see. Back when I first got the car, I took 2 water hoses and let them run in the cowl for about 5 minutes and nothing came out below the dash. Just had a steady waterfall down behind the fenders. I wish I could pull the windshield right now to see what it looks like under there. It'll be this summer before I will be able to pull any of the windows out. I plan on driving the car up to NC this summer to my grandparents house and basically tearing it down to a shell. Then rebuilding it back up with a 302, new transmission, disc brakes, all new springs, and all that good stuff. Thanks for the help guys. For now I'll just wire wheel it all and then lay down a heavy coat of primer and paint. This summer I'll do it with that rust bullet since I plan to do the whole front subframe in it this summer after I replace the radiator support and all.
