How to Fix Rust Spots On a Car

Step 6 Wash and Wax

After the paint had cured a good 48 hours, I washed and waxed the car to bring back the shine. It ended up looking fairly good. It cost me less than $15 and 4-6 hours of labor. I spent an additional 4 hours washing and waxing. If I had taken it to a body shop, it could have cost me $200. So I saved a lot of money and got the satisfaction of doing it myself, which is the best part.

Comments

[MilesPerGallon]

Awesome job on the the fender.

I'm curious, how many miles per gallon do you get on your VW Golf? I'm thinking about buying a diesel. Somebody told me they burn cleaner than gasoline and the engines(if well-maintained) can last a million miles.

[cplthibault]

I currently drive a volkswagen jetta TDI they do certainly burn cleaner, and once upon a time diesel was far cheaper than gas which is unfortunatly not the case anymore. I get an average of about 50 MPG and it costs me about 60$ to fill from empty i get 800km to a tank easily. HIGHLY HIGHLY reccommend anyone to go diesel. only real downfall to diesel is the cost of maintenance but if you compair that against the life span of the car you end up saving in the end as the life span is nearly double that of a gas car.

[spinach_dip]

looks pretty good. I no longer care too much about appearance, because I drive beaters, but whenever I would grind out rust and prime and paint, the rust would return in that same spot within a year. I think the grinding removes all the galvnizing. Although I haven't done any cosmetic bodywork with it, I've had good luck on other things with primer that says it containes zinc. They are also known as cold galvnizing compounds.

[hmakori]

Did you try magic oil.

[hmakori]

I read on another site mercedessource .com and found out that there is magic paint that can stop the rusting right away. Can you try?

[Eric Sullivan]

Galvafroid for instance

[leandrop7]

paint the whole fender so there will be differences in painting!

[hellZEN]

Kudos on your resourcefulness!!! I did AutoBody work back in the day... When things were slow, we did rust/rot work. BTW, they don't galvanize body metal, at least back then - the paint doesn't stick to it. Regarding rerusting .... If you can TOTALLY get to bare metal, you should be ok. If pits remain, you need to treat with a dab of rust treatment. There are two kinds that come to mind 1) a coating that has phosphoric acid and possibly tannic acid like the rustoleum rust reformer stuff or similar product that chemically transforms the rust (iron oxide) into stable Iron phosphate with a coating to seal it (don't sand before priming). 2) products that use oxalic acid and possibly tannic acid, again with some kind of coating left behind. Finally, the old man always told me to "metal prep' the bare metal to remove any residual flakes from grinding and lightly etch the metal, leaving behind a light coating containing zinc. Before priming, we would generally pull the tape back and "feather" the edges on the original paint, so that the new primer comes up level with the old paint. For the color coat, you can lightly scuff the area to allow a fade of the new color into the old. It just takes some 400 or 600 grit paper and a couple of extra minutes.

[Tom83]

I've just started work on removing some rust spots on my car...  However, I get these distinct lines when I pull the tape off...  What do you mean by "feather"-ing the edges??  I'm really stumped on how to blend the new paint into the old paint...  Also do you have any suggestions on how to make the new paint "pop" the clear coat doesn't seem to give it the same shine, I've also tried buffing it as well...  Thanks!

[hellZEN]

 The paint is not going to be a 100% match in terms of texture or color.  Factory, paint and sprayers are different.  So you have to do some blending.  
 1 BLENDING THE SURFACE - Feathering or "feather edging" means, that you sand it out so that you can see the layers as you move away from the repair.   What you are doing is creating a very gradual ramp in the paint from the bare metal to the original paint surface.  This will be filled with primer and maybe even a light coat of putty.   You will then level off the repair fine paper and a block so that the primer is exactly level with the old paint.  Check with your hand to make sure there are no edges - Your eyes will not be sensitive enough for this.  When you are done , you are ready for your base color coat.  Sometimes I used to put the base color and the final color coat all in one shot.
2 BLENDING THE COLOR AND TEXTURE -   Of course the whole area has to be prepped so that paint will stick when it lands.  If there is a natural divider, like a crease in the body, or a molding, that is a good place to cut the new work from the original. There should be no tape near the repair, unless it is an edge in the body.  After the Primer has been covered, you mist the color to blend with the original .   I used to thin the paint out and go out some distance from the repair.  It may be easier to clearcoat the entire area than to attempt to blend , but that is a judgement call.  The old clearcoat may be more pebbly or have micro scratches that will make it stand out.  This might make some of it easier to see:
www.bukisa.com/videos/185975_how-to-feather-edge-paint

[DirtMcGurt]

 I've found the best thing you can do to make this step easier is GOOD filler.  We used some stuff called All metal which is really good for fine work as it sets up hard as rock so you can feather it better.  Crappier filler/bondo won't feather well and you will end up with lines between the edge of filler and the original surface.

[pfred1]

Hmm never thought about the zinc angle. Whenever I paint I never know if the rust is going to come up or not. Sometimes it doesn't seem to matter what sort of prep I do, crap job it holds up, good job and it pops go figure? If anyone really wants to see what it takes to paint these guys here pretty much did it up:

http://www.imperialclub.com/Repair/Body/Painting101/index.htm

BTW that spot you had there that wasn't rust this is rust!

http://home.comcast.net/~pcf1/115.jpg

You can tell I don't just jump right out there and do bodywork anymore can't you?