Door Rust Solutions?

If the car is a long-term keeper, you should probably replace at least the door skin. Your car had no rustproofing when new, so after 27 years you'll find more rust than you can detect now.

I doubt a cut-and-patch job (bondo or metal) is going to do more than get you through another year. I had this done on my '79 VW Rabbit when I was in high school and it was a losing battle.

The ultimate money-no-object solution, and the only sure way, is to disassemble, strip and respray the entire car. Then you'll find all the lurking rust, and end up with proper color match on all panels. Obviously the expense would be hard to recover.

 

Yep, cut it out and weld in new metal. Up by the belt-line though? The doors usually rust on the very bottom because that's where the water collects. Pull your door panels and you should be able to somewhat see what shape the inside of the doors are in.

If you don't want to tackle it yourself, any good body shop should be able to fix it for a reasonable price. Reasonable that is for a Ferrari

 

That's what makes me think there's more than meets the eye, and that a spot patch is waste of time. Hard to diagnose from here, though.

 

I had both of my doors done this summer. As usual it was along the bottoms near the front and I wanted to get it done befor it spread to the outer skin. I looked for a good body shop that specialized in restoration. They removed both doors and cut out the rust. They then made new sheet metal patches . I posted pictures a few months back. Job came out great and they didn't need to touch the outside skins. They told me the door was solid and didn't see to many issues. They also rustproofed both doors. Just as a point here I was told that when you see bubbles it is most likely a pin hole in the paint that absorbs water and starts the rust process. If that is the problem then you don't need a skin and can clean it and braze/fill the mark. If by chance you can see the rust fron the inside of the door then you have a major problem and MAY need to replace the skin. So I would find the best body guy and get a price to both patch or replace the skin. The only way to tell how much damage you have is to pull the door panel or even remove the door and go from there. Good luck and keep us posted.

 

What I would do is this. Have the door taken apart. Look at it to see if the door is structually sound. If there is rust present, take off as much as the loose stuff you can get off an then coat it with this chemical that stops rust.

Take a look here.

http://eastwood.resultspage.com/search?p=Q&ts=custom&w=rust+paint


This place has several solutions that will stop rust and prevent it at a very affordable cost. As far as the surface goes, that can be repaired and you should have many years of trouble free use.

 

Agree with all above...when I was in college I "restored" a 911. It barely had any surface rust. I scraped, "rustconvereted", primed,patched, painted. Turned out great. 3 months later it was right back...SIGH. I didn't have access to the inner panels where the rust was. Big lesson.

If you want to fix this cheap, and have it last several years, you can do it yourself, but you will need a sandblaster. I have done this on some of our daily drivers, that get beat up quite a bit with scratches, and then start to rust...

1) degrease
2) sandlast the rusted area + about 1/4-1/2 inch past it.
3) wipe with acetone. wipe with ospho (optional)
4) use some autoparts touchup primer
5) autoparts touchup paint (helps to have an airbrush)
6) autoparts touch up clearcoat...

It turns out pretty decent. Its not 100%, but adequate. The key is the sandblaster. If you just sand it manually, you never get all of the rust. I have tried tons of times. With the sandblaster I get fantastic results. Not concours, but decent.

Now, here is the catch. If the rust has penetrated to the other side, you have to get ALL of that rust out. You might be able to get into your doors with a sandblaster also, then por-15 it.

This is a 100$ fix that should last for several years.

Of course the best way to do it is cut/weld, or reskin. But thats $2000+. You have to figure out what your budget is. Then you have to paint the doors...which won't match the rest of the car... Until these cars become 60,000$+ cars...extensive body work is a financially ruinous move...


Also, once the doors start to rust, you will probably have tons of rust elsewhere...frame, supports, etc, etc...

good luck!

 

The Eastwood rust encapsulator works well I use it. I have a old 1994 Ford pickup as my daily driver here in Michigan and I started getting some rust on the tailgate flange about 8 years ago. I cleaned up the rust with some sandpaper and painted the area with rust encapsulator and here's a trick and it works I put a thin layer of the vasoline over it. No rust until last year, this area of the truck gets salt punished. I wax and coat both my door flanges with vasoline before every winter since it was new and to this day no rust on the door flanges I wish I did the tailgate from the beginning but I didn't. What I would do with your Ferrari is clean up the rust and fix the hole, paint the inside of the door area effected and the area where the skin and door bottom meet with Eastwood rust encapsulator. Then when it drys add a thin layer of vasoline as a water barrier. I have the door panels off my 308 now and the inside looks good but I'm going to do the vasoline trick because it works.

 

Nice idea Jim,,, But for bad rust, just punch holes in the door bottom with a hole saw, sand blast to see what you have.

Cut metal, weld sheet metal,, hammer.

Phospo all bear metal,
inside of door use that Eastwood product,
but outside,,,
use SEM 39683 self etching primer.

Luckly,, my Mondial doors aren't so Bad,,, it's a California car.

 

My 308 doors are in great shape also but I'm still doing the vasoline trick. I've got the door panels off now to have some dents removed and I was happy with what I saw inside the doors. After, you fix the rust do this with the Eastwood product and vasoline the area where the inner butts against the outer skin inside the door. I get all kinds of compliments on how good my truck looks and after I tell everyone it's been through 13 Michigan winters they can't believe it. The vasoline prevents the water getting into the seam.

Jim

 

If you are going to weld some sheet metal, you may want to use some bronze MIG brazing wire. A caveat, some welding shops are not aware of this product and will tell you that you can not braze with MIG. That is not the case. Some of the benefits are lower temperatures and, therefore, less warping and less hammering of the weld. Also the heat affected area will be smaller and lesss or no burning of the original antirust coatings. Another nice benefit is that when you grind it, since it will not spark, you can tell precisely when you are grinding the original metal and that will give a better, more precise job. Finally, because of the lower temperatures it is a lot easier to use than regular welding wire as it will not burn through as readily as steel wire. If yoy are not experienced at sheet metal welding this could make all the difference.

Gianluca

 

Yes, I thought you were having the problem on the inside the doors. The area back edge of the door where the outer skin wraps around the edge of the door is difficult to fix, water got into the seam and it started rusting. For your Ferrari you need to get this rust out for a long term fix. In the case of my trucks tailgate I was doing the same thing but being a work truck I sanded the rust out as much as I could then painted it with the Eastwood product and a coat vasoline, it keeps it in check for a long time. The key is not letting the rust start in the first place that's why on the pickup doors I started coating the outer door pinch flange with wax and then a thin film of vasoline before very winter since it was new. There's still no rust yet on the doors and the vehicle will start it's 14th winter here shortly. Do you wash your car alot?
After you fix the area keep it waxed and dry and try not to let a lot of water run down the windows if you can, they rust like crazy inside the doors.

 

Gianluca,

Thank you... WOW.

I will be gitting a new MIG next month, A Miller 252,,, push pull.
And, some MIG wire might be fun to experiment with some of our very thin,,,,,,,,,!!!!! Italian sheet metal.

(A 1976 Chevy Nova was built like a tank,,, compared to these little race cars.)

Ed