Rust actually kills cars dead?

alfadriver said:

Appleseed said:

Lighter cars are faster. 100 lbs = 1/10th at the strip.

It's only lighter if there are holes- as the same volume of rust weighs more than iron or steel.  

That's assuming none of it flakes off. It all flakes off. Then we just have to trust the load bearing paint to hold her together. 

Maybe it is me but it seems I see less rusty vehicles than I used to.   Some of that may be due to more use of plastic body parts.

Those rusted out rear bumpers on pickups gets me.

On a lightly traveled NYS highway I saw a sign that said "Salt Test Area"

It is true that cars in general don't rust as bad as they used to, but you do still see examples like the pictures above.

Comments suggesting that northern states stop salting their roads remind me of this: there is a measurable increase in the salinity of the bodies of water in those States.

stuart in mn said:

It is true that cars in general don't rust as bad as they used to, but you do still see examples like the pictures above.

It absolutely takes longer to happen. It used to be nothing to see visible rust on 2-3 year old vehicles here. Now it tends to take at least 8-10 years. The Buick in the original post is 21 years old, and that truck in my photo was at least 15 years old at the time.

When I was growing up here in ole Georgey, we used to joking say that on a quiet night you could actually HEAR a Chevy rust.  Once the internet was invented, I realized were just plain wrong.

In reply to TopNoodles :

We need salt.  Every car on the road practically is awd, has abs, and active handling.  Sure.  We need lottsa salt.  Cinders too to wreck those crazy motorcycles in the spring.

It’s very much manufacturer based. Every single 10 year old Mazda, Subaru etc has rust wheel arches where 20 year old Volvo’s are still mint. 

Adrian_Thompson said:

It’s very much manufacturer based. Every single 10 year old Mazda, Subaru etc has rust wheel arches where 20 year old Volvo’s are still mint. 

I saw a rusty Volvo 850 not long ago and it absolutely blew my mind. I can only assume it was due to shoddy bodywork at some point. 

Jordan Rimpela said:

Adrian_Thompson said:

It’s very much manufacturer based. Every single 10 year old Mazda, Subaru etc has rust wheel arches where 20 year old Volvo’s are still mint. 

I saw a rusty Volvo 850 not long ago and it absolutely blew my mind. I can only assume it was due to shoddy bodywork at some point. 

Yeah, it must have been. I had a 855R here in Wisconsin that was actually someone's winter beater for a decade before I bought it, and it was still a clean car by any standard.

iceracer said:

Those rusted out rear bumpers on pickups gets me.

 

That ticks me off , too. When I was looking at buying used trucks they all suffer bumper and wheel well rust, except the Nissan Titan. For some reason you rarely see rusty ones here in Michigan.

I saw this Prius when I was catching a flight back to TX from O'Hare last summer. 

My family 98 Pontiac Grand Prix rotted out from the rockers. Car looked fine on top. But the rockers were getting to the point of unsafe when the water pump gave out and we scrapped the car. 

Aspen said:

The new liquid salt solution that has been in use for the past decade is making rust start faster and deeper than before.  That salt spray makes its way into every nook and cranny. 

I take my Silverado to the local rock quarries for work.  The spray calcium chloride on the roads for dust suppression and add in all the lime in the area.  

My 3 year old Silverado has a lot of frame rust already......maybe I need to look at my commissions again.  

Thanks, all, for the replies. I'm not sure how to break this to her. I got to be the one to tell her her Cavalier motor was blown too. Then she bought this one for $500. And I've only lived her for six months.

It's hard to describe what a difference this makes in my mindset. I'm used to looking under cars for leaks, torn boots, but to see cradles rusted through is unsettling. Before my former neighbor (who I affectionately refer to as "ol' drunky") hit my wife's '00 Cavalier one night and totalled it I was starting to get concerned about the rust in the engine cradle. Happily, he helped us buy an Accord. But I'd forgotten about that until Sunday when I saw this.

My ex MIL had a 74 Buick LeSabre convertible that she drove way beyond its expiration date. She finally gave it up when she smelled something burning and i pointed out that the body mounts had rotted so bad that the back seat was resting on the muffler. The trunk was swiss cheese and the gas tank was threatening to drop from its straps and drag on the pavement 

swampyankee said:

My ex MIL had a 74 Buick LeSabre convertible that she drove way beyond its expiration date. She finally gave it up when she smelled something burning and i pointed out that the body mounts had rotted so bad that the back seat was resting on the muffler. The trunk was swiss cheese and the gas tank was threatening to drop from its straps and drag on the pavement 

 

That one takes the cake

Neal Young - Rust Never Sleeps. 

The king is gone
but he's not forgotten
This is the story
of a Johnny Rotten
It's better to burn out
than it is to rust
The king is gone
but he's not forgotten.

In my younger years I drove a series of Minnesota rustbuckets.  

One was a 1969 Ford Torino GT.  One of the rear leaf springs rusted away so it had a permanent lean, and the front mounting bolts for the front seat pulled through the floor so it was kind of like sitting in a rocking chair.  One day I was driving down the road and heard a flap flap flap BANG noise; I looked in the rear view mirror and a big chunk of the rear quarter panel had torn off in the breeze.

Another was a 1971 VW Beetle.  On a windy day I could feel the back half of the car moving in a different direction from the front half of the car.

Finally there was a 1967 Opel Kadette station wagon.  A previous owner had patched the rust holes in the quarter panels by pop riveting on some of those blue plastic mini-toboggans, and slathered them over with bondo.  The driver's door A pillar was so rusted away that the hinges weren't attached to the car anymore; if I opened that door it would fall off the car, so I just crawled in from the passenger side.

The other thing you need to think about with rustbuckets, especially those being driven by loved ones, is the condition of the brake lines. I've had them burst, and that can lead to a very bad outcome.

In reply to Tom_Spangler :

Hardlines for brake and fuel are just a common replacement item for late 2000's and older GM trucks here in Michigan. Its one of those questions you ask when buying used....has the trans been rebuilt yet?  Brake lines replaced? What about fuel? 

The Moose Tour we took the kids on in NH told us the Moose come to, and reach their young to, come to the sides of the roads to eat the grasses and get their share of salt from the winter runoff.

There are many salt mines in the Midwest, it's cheap and local so that's why it's used on the roads. If we had inspections up here, no car older than 10 years would pass and most folks can't afford to replace cars that often. Bad driving causes way way more accidents than mechanical failure.

That Regal is fixable, but most shops probably won't want to.

NY has inspections and that car is only a little bit away from passing.  The only rust related critera are that the brake lines aren't leaking and the suspension mounts are still attached.  Missing floor pans, no rockers, bottom 6" of the doors gone, etc. is all perfectly fine as long as the suspension mounts are intact.  

Gearheadotaku said:

There are many salt mines in the Midwest, it's cheap and local so that's why it's used on the roads. If we had inspections up here, no car older than 10 years would pass and most folks can't afford to replace cars that often. Bad driving causes way way more accidents than mechanical failure.

That Regal is fixable, but most shops probably won't want to.

I will not be the one to rescue that car, that’s for sure, and so it probably won’t happen, but what is your suggested fix for a case like that?

Ahhh... rust. There’s a reason my ratty c10 gets so much attention here. We haven’t seen a late 70’s c10 with floors, doors and a bed in 20 years. The day I brought it home I could have flipped it locally and made a 50% profit.