Rust Resistant SUV?

rslifkin wrote: Personally, I say they need to mandate snow tires in any area where it snows more than occasionally (or at least say that if you get into an accident without them, the accident is automatically 100% your fault). And then require significant reductions in salt usage. It's insane to watch states like NY brag about how many millions of pounds of salt they use in a winter...

Province of Quebec has done this. I believe it is Dec 1 to April 1 or something like that. Use of Winter tires is mandatory for Quebec plated cars.

NGTD wrote:

rslifkin wrote: Personally, I say they need to mandate snow tires in any area where it snows more than occasionally (or at least say that if you get into an accident without them, the accident is automatically 100% your fault). And then require significant reductions in salt usage. It's insane to watch states like NY brag about how many millions of pounds of salt they use in a winter...

Province of Quebec has done this. I believe it is Dec 1 to April 1 or something like that. Use of Winter tires is mandatory for Quebec plated cars.

It's from December 15th to March 15th. It has caused a lot of weird cheap chinese tire brands to appear. Which might explain why they haven't seen the expected decrease in accidents in winter.

Since people are nit-picking, I'll be much more specific:

The newer the car, the more corrosion resistant. If you buy something from outside the rust belt, it won't matter what the previous owner did. Now, if you purchase said car (with no existing rust and good coatings), you can continue to wash it and keep it clean and it will last a very long time.

What you consider an SUV for your own purposes is independent of this.

In reply to NGTD:

That's not salt, that's brine

Depends on the vehicle I'd say. My moms 05 T&C has more rust than my 90 Dakota does.

I'm lazy so my answer is just buy 900 dollar durangos off CL and drive them until the rust gets too bad and replace it with another 900 dollar durango. God knows there's enough of them on there.

I have an 07 4runner. A little spot of rust showed up on the tailgate where a chrome/plastic piece attaches. I've seen a few others with the same spot (I live in the chicago suburbs). The rest of it is pretty good. A bit of surface rust is starting on the frame rails.

NGTD wrote:

rslifkin wrote: Personally, I say they need to mandate snow tires in any area where it snows more than occasionally (or at least say that if you get into an accident without them, the accident is automatically 100% your fault). And then require significant reductions in salt usage. It's insane to watch states like NY brag about how many millions of pounds of salt they use in a winter...

Province of Quebec has done this. I believe it is Dec 1 to April 1 or something like that. Use of Winter tires is mandatory for Quebec plated cars.

This is the case in most of Europe as well. During winter months, it is a BIG FAT TICKET for anyone found on the Autobahn without dedicated winter tires. Even every rental car has performance winter tires on them between like November and March.

Has anyone seen a rusty lexus anything? Cause I haven't. (Excluding bad body repairs).

irish44j wrote:

NGTD wrote:

rslifkin wrote: Personally, I say they need to mandate snow tires in any area where it snows more than occasionally (or at least say that if you get into an accident without them, the accident is automatically 100% your fault). And then require significant reductions in salt usage. It's insane to watch states like NY brag about how many millions of pounds of salt they use in a winter...

Province of Quebec has done this. I believe it is Dec 1 to April 1 or something like that. Use of Winter tires is mandatory for Quebec plated cars.

This is the case in most of Europe as well. During winter months, it is a BIG FAT TICKET for anyone found on the Autobahn without dedicated winter tires. Even every rental car has performance winter tires on them between like November and March.

Really? I rented an Audi through Avis in December and it did not have snow tires. This was in Munich. Drove to Neuschwanstein Castle with no problems. On the way back it snowed quite a bit.

sesto elemento wrote: Has anyone seen a rusty lexus anything? Cause I haven't. (Excluding bad body repairs).

I've seen RX300s and some of the older ES300s rust, but not much else.

Buy the cleanest example whatever car you want, then fluid film the hell out of it multiple times throughout the winter. Inside and out of the frame, inside all the doors, hood, hatch, and rockers. I even take the fender liners out and spray the insides with FF. Wash and wax the outside often. In my experience in Michigan, this will get you about 10 years of fairly rust free driving before the road commission begins to win.

I can vouch for Quebec plated cars having winter tires in the winter. I got lucky on work travel and spotted the plate while there was snow on the ground, sure enough - had pirelli snow tires.

I think the statistics were that 10% of cars without snow tires were causing 90% of the accidents...