Why we hate road salt

For those of you who dont live in the northern states where the roads are salted heavily as soon as the snow starts to fly, here is why road salt sucks.

That's right, the rotor rusted away. Ugh. Needless to say I put new brakes on the winter beater Crown Vic tonite and it reaffirmed my decision to park the Abarth until the salt goes away and buy a beater.

In related news, I found out why my steering was wandering. All better now.

I had to tap my F150 drums to get 'em off... They crumbled into rust-dust. Can't imagine they had too many stops left in them. Eastern Ma here.

on my 91 caprice the original rotors rusted through the vanes and split apart before they wore out from use at 149k. road salt sucks.

Ya, BTDT. "Free" F150 from my inlaws.. only needed Rotors, Drums, shoes, pads, lines and calipers.. on a 10 year old truck all from rust. That will be rusted away by the time it's 20 years old. Quote my mechanic: I've never seen a truck that looks so good in the body, but is SO rusted underneath

Last night I called the time of death on a friends Taurus, that "funny clunk" was the passenger side firewall area subframe tie in point rusting off the body and banging back into the remains of the body when you slowed down.

I hate road salt. I've recently torn apart some GM S-trucks - a '91 and a '93, both with ~150k on them and both spent their lives in Wisconsin. They were rusted like a mo-fo: perforated body panels, frozen hardware, etc. The '91:

I recently acquired another GM S-truck - a '93, with ~250k on it and only recently came to Wisconsin from Washington. Almost rust free. I haven't done much with it, other than parking it in the back of the shop, so I don't know what to expect when I start tearing it apart (more than it is already). The day I brought it to the shop:

Salt is de Debil

My 83 RX-7 has had the same rotors on it since I bought it...13 years ago.

I can't even imagine having to deal with that much rust. I think I would swear off working on cars forever.

This past summer I welded new chassis rails into the front end of my 1999 Miata. I could push my thumb through the original double-walled steel.

Road salt is the bane of my automotive existence. My first car ('92 240SX) had massive holes in the rocker panels and trunk floor from rusting out. My third car ('98 Impreza 2.2L) had such horrible suspension rust the rear control arm bolts resembled blooming onions because of how they were splitting. My last winter car ('93 Eclipse AWD) was leaking oil and coolant from every hard line underhood, and the fuel and brake lines looked like they would be punctured if so much as a pebble impacted them.

Yeah, my '94 Alfa 164 is off the road with a mysterious engine problem, but compared to my other old cars it's a joy to work on because it's a North Carolina car, and has almost no rust whatsoever. Galvanized body panels FTW.

I won't live somewhere with road salt. Did that in college, moved away as soon as I possibly could. I like driving in the snow, I hate driving in the salt. I also won't buy a car that's been exposed to salt for any length of time, and it's obvious when they have. Working on salty cars is one of the worst forms of wrenching I know (second to trying to diagnose failed computer/electronic problems that use proprietary communications).

Bryce

In reply to RexSeven:

Every rusty thing you mentioned was galvanized or cadmium plated (even better, once common on good hardware) when new.

My 02 WRX has only 125k kms (about 75k miles). Drivetrain excellent. Body not so much.

Being from Wisconsin, I looked at that rotor and thought "isn't that what they all look like? I also think it's funny how people on this forum talk about things like 80s Japanese cars like they exist in real life.

I had to pop for a new set of snow tires for the Tacoma this week. i pulled the winter wheels out of the barn and they are a mess. Salt got under the wheel weights and destroyed the aluminum. I tried looking for some 16" Toyota takeoffs, but its not a great time of year for finding that kind of stuff.

This makes me even happier that I live in Florida.

Fueled by Caffeine told me about Fluid Film. I just coated my Tacoma frame. After a bunch of research, nothing but great news about this stuff. I bought mine at a John Deere dealer and it goes along way. It was around $9 for a big spray can and $40 for a gallon. It leaves a smell for a little while, but it's non-toxic. Basically lanolin oil. We'll see how it goes. Yeah, salt sucks.

You guys are buying the wrong cars. All mine have a coating of oil on the underside from all the leaks.

I've snapped rotors removing them from the car here in Michigan. The blue wrench and an 8lb mini sledge still took the better part of an hour per side. Living in the south to wrench on cars must be a beautiful thing.

on the other hand....

we don't have very many nasty bugs move into our projects.

I know a guy from a Ford truck site that sprays his entire underside (edit: his trucks underside) with used Diesel. I think I might try that on mine.

I dream of passing this truck onto my son in 6 years but I'm honestly not sure it'll still be a truck by then.

Grtechguy wrote: on the other hand.... we don't have very many nasty bugs move into our projects.

This. After I saw that Black Widow in the builds thread i'll take ice and snow and biting wind with salty roads anytime!

I've spent my entire wrenching life here in Arizona, I tip my hat to you who deal with that nonsense regularly. I forget how easy we have it here.

In reply to ebonyandivory: Serious question what is used diesel? I thought it turned into ash and vapor when used.

Salt laughs at galvanized and cad plating. It's just a garnish.

Been in MI my whole life, salt is a four letter word.

Fletch1 wrote: Fueled by Caffeine told me about Fluid Film. I just coated my Tacoma frame. After a bunch of research, nothing but great news about this stuff. I bought mine at a John Deere dealer and it goes along way. It was around $9 for a big spray can and $40 for a gallon. It leaves a smell for a little while, but it's non-toxic. Basically lanolin oil. We'll see how it goes. Yeah, salt sucks.

I've been looking into that stuff too. Glad to hear it's gotten good reviews. I'll need to pick some up soon.

When Maxwell House went to plastic what are y'all doing about exhaust repair now?