Let's say you bought a nice old truck and a few months later you noticed that little rust bubbles have formed under the paint, around one of the corners of your windshield.
Then you do an inspection of the whole truck and find more bubbles in the fenders, in the body and under the cab. What do you do?
Don't start screaming and don't run to your body shop just yet. Old truck rust has no cure but it is a normal thing. If you see bubbles which are less than half an inch wide, your truck will not be consumed by it immediately. You have some time until the problem gets really serious. The small bubbles you see are only a warning sign that the problem will require your attention.
I don't want you to get the wrong idea and to think that I am saying for you not to worry with the first signs of corrosion. That's not what I'm saying and I don't consider myself an expert who would be able to advise you on what to do. I am just using my own experience with my 1954 Chevy truck.
When I bought the pickup corrosion had taken hold of almost every part of my old truck. I dismantled the whole truck and did a complete frame up restoration. The first thing we did was to sand blast all the metal parts to get rid of the corrosion. There were holes in several places and they were all patched. To make a long story short, the truck came out of the restoration with no rust at all.
About three years later I saw a couple of bubbles under the paint, around the windshield and at the bottom of the right front fender. Old truck rust was back. I could do three things: have the rust removed from those two spots, paint the whole truck again or just wait. Being prone to procrastination I decided to wait.
Four more years went by and during this time several other corrosion spots were discovered in the fenders, the cab and the cargo bed. The first two rust bubbles, around the windshield and at the bottom of the right fender, became much larger than they were when first discovered.
The solution? A new coat of paint needed to be applied to the old truck. After almost eight years there were several scratches and the paint was beginning to fade. I found a good body shop and had the rust spots removed before a new coat of paint was applied to the truck. It looks great now and it is a good feeling to look at is and see that there is no corrosion to be seen.
But I don't have any illusions. There is no corrosion to be seen on my truck now but nature is working and rust will come back. Old truck rust always comes back. It may be already developing in unseen places like under the cab, inside the fenders, under the cargo bed and so on. I can't do anything about that but I can keep my eyes open and when I see a little bubble under the paint I can repair it immediately or wait another couple of years.
One important tip to help with the prevention of corrosion: keep your truck inside your garage. This way water will only attack it when the truck is driven in the rain or when washed.
So, my advice is for you to keep your eyes open and once in a while do an inspection of your truck to see if there are any rust spots developing. And remember these words: you can wait a while until you're good and ready to tackle the problem but make sure you do it or you'll lose your truck to rust.
The removal of old truck rust doesn't have to be hard or expensive though. In our next article we'll tell you how to remove rust with household vinegar!
