NiG

Hi all,

I've been very sad recently
We were working on my GTA, but in the course of disassembling it (in order to fix some interior things) we found some rust. I marked the parts in this image:




Below some real pictures of the various zones:











I would like to know what do you think about the seriousness of the rust. Are these thing really dangerous?


Is it normal rust after 24 years, or is it worse?


What kind of restoration do you suggest me for each part?

THANKS!!

bye

padak

iTrader: (10)

Looks very repairable, and very worth it. Find a shop you totally trust for the job, and possible always check for a 2nd opinion with another shop.

Over here we have shops all over the place equipped to deal with this, over-there, I am not sure, you would know better. I do say it's fixable and worth it.

Looks like it's all going to be under the ground effects, which is why you may have missed it. Get it repaired, will cost a pretty penny but like I said worth it. Also, have them get rid of the surface rust on the bottom of the car and then have them coat it. There are tons of products they can use, but the underneath of the car needs to be treated, because that is the worse part on our cars that goes.

ZsTransAm

That stinks. Those are pretty common rust spots, especially in places that salt their roads, but will not be an easy or cheap fix. Here are your options as I see them - Pay several thousand dollars to have someone cut out and weld in new metal and repaint it. Or grind down the rust and use POR15 to hopefully stop it from getting much worse. Honestly I think if there are holes then its too far gone for this, but it IS an option I guess. Or put the ground effects back on and sell it or just drive it knowing that rust is slowing going to destroy your car.

LarryD

Check your firewall... This one just sneaked up on me.. The seam sealer in the wiper transmission well where the upper and lower firewalls join will crack and allow water down in between the two.. I found it as water dripping on the passenger floor from under the dash.. The obvious indication that I missed was streaks running down the firewall behind the engine.. I pulled the wiper transmission out and dug at the seam sealer.. It cracked and came out in chunks.. Rust underneath but I think I caught it in time.. I cleaned out the old seam sealer all the way across the cowl, painted it with POR 15 (usually its runny so it got all the way through), then got new seam sealer and filled the joint back in.... Stopped the leak and hopefully will now stop any more rust....

NiG

Thanks guys, so as far as I understood it's a common and repairable rust. Yeah I'm going to repair it, I have a nice body shop that already knows what to do. Not cheap, yeah.

Question is: has anybody experienced something like this also? Is it really common, or is it a sign of bad car usage?

Im not going to re-sell the car. Those cars are very rare in Europe and in Italy.

LaddyD, thank you very much for your advice. I'm going to take the car at the shop and surely I'll check with the guy the firewall. Hope nothing bad will pop up :/

I'll let you know.
thanks!

FirebirdUSX

How the heck you havent seen that when you bought it?

Usually the floor pans rust when the t tops leak on these cars.The rust on your car is from the plastic effects Trans Am have.The water probably sit in them and rusted out the metal....no biggie. Underside looks very clean thou.I don't think it was badly maintained ,its just a bad design I guess.

When you mount them back make sure the water has where to drain so it won't rust again.

well you know what they say ...if its perfect it doesnt have personality

ZsTransAm

Those are pretty common spots for a 3rd gen that hasn't lived in a garage its whole life.

I had rust in similar places, though not as severe. I had to cut out and patch in front of one of the rear wheels. The rest I was able to sandblast and coat with POR15, then paint with the rest of the car. Luckily I didn't have any floorpan rust.

89junkyardgta

You should be checking your floors for significant holes, and make sure the mounts that the rear trailing/control arms fasten into on the floor are sound. It looks like a car that has been driven in a lot of wet weather/seen salt. The "purple" damage is partly because the car hit something on ground like a speed bump or someone started jacking it up there. That "hole" looks more like the factory seam being pulled open. Sandblast and POR-15 (alternatively Rust Bullet, but I've only used POR) is a good course of action for the floors. Just follow the instructions to the letter. That stuff will even fill pinholes.

Scorpner

iTrader: (4)

IMO, that is typical for a car driven in a city during the winter time. Does the car have a history of being in that type of area? Alternatively, cars kept near the ocean can also be affected by rust due to the salt in the air. The problem with these cars is because of the way that they are constructed, water can bring the salt inside of areas like the rocker panel (the enclosed area under the door sills), and other places like the front strut towers and the lower firewall as mentioned. Often the rust is more extensive than what you can see. IMO, you need to step back and take a thorough evaluation checking all areas where metal is pinch welded together as well as the T-Top area (head liner typically sags) and then figure out the cost of repairs. Ground effects also hold in water/salt where you can't see it so it's very common for them to rust when driven in salty conditions. Also if leaves are not removed water can be held just inside the fenders in front of the doors. Also the bottoms inside of the doors should be checked, they get clogged up and hold water as well.

The red & green are typical of salty roads where the salt water is thrown up from the rear wheel. You can also remove the jack/tire to check this from the inside. It is also important to check just forward of the rear wheels to see if the rocker panels are still in good shape. Also check along the outer edge of the fender because that often rusts but is filled in with bondo, so you may not know how extensive it may be.

If you are able to, I would remove the carpeting to see what the metal looks like from the inside. One thing people often overlook is that when you get in and out of your car during the winter you bring in small amount of salt water that melts into the carpet and sits on top of the metal where it can't get out. IMO, that is a more reasonable explanation for the floors rotting out. In one of my Camaros, I had special deluxe carpeting with a thick rubber backing that protected the floor underneath.


Here is a thread I found that actually shows the inside of the rocker panels (post #11). It would be good for you to get an idea of how and where our cars can rust.
https://www.thirdgen.org/forums/body...n-project.html

Here is some front rocker panel rust. It looks like the web page is trying to sell stuff, but the info & pics are informative, especially where it shows how the salt/rust works itself in-between the metal panels.
http://www.superchevy.com/how-to/080...placement.html

FirebirdUSX

@Scorpner

Where is the hole that allows water in the rocker panels?
Newer cars have strenght beams inside the rocker panels (for the side crash safety) ,but none has a hole outside to allow water in.

Scorpner

iTrader: (4)

Water infiltrates via capillary action between the sheet metal. It also gets in via vapor form as well as in powder form during some winter conditions. Once it's inside it can't be easily washed out.

FirebirdUSX

so whats the "simplest" thing people can do to avoid it? I mean I better do something now before it gets rusty.

Scorpner

iTrader: (4)

There's not really a whole lot you can do about it. (If it rusts out in this manner you won't see it until it comes through from the back side.) If you try sealing the seams it will trap water inside and make things worse. I was just told about a wax product on here that you could try but you need to be careful with how it is applied so it doesn't trap water. It's based on the principle of how grease and/or wax adheres to the metal so salt/water can get at it. Remember too that salt is really only a problem in cites that use a lot of it and that's only if you drive during those times. Salt in the air that's typical of living by the ocean is different and I don't have a whole lot of knowledge on that.

The one thread I posted earlier shows an image of the inside of a rocker btw.

FirebirdUSX

yes i saw that.That's why this whole thing made me ask.I could have water in the rocker panels and no know about it.

My car is not a Trans Am and I don't have those plastic effects around the car but I had a small rust spot(maybe 5cm long) on the driver's side about 15cm from the back wheel on the rocker panel.It was on the exterior and the paint was peeling off .It was not through the metal .

Luckly my car is hard top and never got leaks inside so floors are fine.

Scorpner

iTrader: (4)

You could. But most likely there would be rust in other places as well, like your strut supports and inside of the rear passenger wheel well etc.

Sometimes the paint gets scratched and then rust gets under the paint that way. That sounds more like what you have.

NiG

I'm not a car expert at all. I'm a computer engineer, professional magician and sporadic musician The best I could do before buying the car was asking the owner to take it to my mechanic in order to completely check it. This guy is supposedly a great mechanic. I told him to completely check it.
Actually he looked carefully and spotted three rusted points (purple, under the battery and another not visible in my post).
I decided to buy the car anyway because it was told me they were normal, not urgent, and very repairable stuff.

THEN, in the course of working on the interiors, me and the "interiors expert guy" unveiled the green and the red spots, the most serious and most expensive They were invisible. We spotted just because we removed the plastics in the trunk when putting the new audio amplifier.

The blue was very unnoticeable too. I saw it because we completely remove the interior panels/moquette. From the outside, it was covered by the outer lower plastic parts (dunno the precise english name, in Italy we call the "skirt" or "miniskirt").

Here you have a complete rust map of my car:



About floor panels. From inside the passenger side was perfect, the driver side had some minor superficial rust spots. There you have some pictures:






I put some "anti-rust", white when dried:




The car was from England, and England is famous for its rusty cars. I didn't know that before buying mine

About floors from underneath, I don't have good pictures but they are supposed to be ok.
I have this, in which you can see the "C" spot.



T-top zone seemed super ok to me, but I'm about to remove the headliner soon. Nothing to notice about it so far.

What do you mean with "ground effects"?

Thanks for the rust-talking links, im going to read them right now

calmhotrod

iTrader: (-1)

I would blast it clean that's what I did on my buddy bird

FirebirdUSX

Well if you looked after a musclecar you are more mechanic and car enthusiast than most men in Europe who drive those tiny shopping carts and want to race you at stop lights

What you have there is nothing major and for a UK car with non stop rain that is really solid.Inside thats just surface rust.I dont think its from t top leaks because usually that goes inside along the rocker panel.Probably was some moisture under the carpet...no biggie and can be cleaned and fixed with some paint (thou for me even thou its under the carpet I'd make sure it blends in (yes I'm that sick ... )

The thingy in the last pic (that looks like a drain) is ,from what I understand, used by Pontiac to paint the cars in some s**t .If you ask about the rust spot...that looks superficial ...clean it and cover it with something.

Don't forget to clean the interior and detail it...make it 1 million € before you put back the carpet.

P.S. I cant see well from the pics but that's not a safe spot to jack up these cars.The jack point should be on the k member or the subframe itself (btw you could instal some subframe connectors if you are there....they are cheap but improve the car by 100% if you ask me).

Scorpner

iTrader: (4)

From the additional pics it doesn't look too bad.
On the right hand pic, sometimes it rusts between the body and the subframe (The part that extends to the engine bay).



The rust spot you pointed out (C) is from the assembly process. The way the metal sits close together is exactly why water seeps in and rusts those out. You should be able to remove it and clean it up. I don't recall the correct terminology but Google: Camaro Floor Pan Drain Plugs images
And you'll see what I'm talking about.

I'm not sure if I'm seeing that right but the hoist arm should be under the subframe (black part on the inside) and not the flat part of the body. It can collapse there as well as the rockers if it's lifted from those points.


The inside pics of the floors look ok even though it might have been better to see before the white anti-rust was put on. What was it actually called? What you call anti noise paint is also rust preventer in the form of a tar type material that keeps water away.

Edit: I think I said a lot of the same things as FirebirdUSX, but you get the idea.

NiG

Thank you guys, your opinion and advices are very important!!

Yeah that's true I love sporty cars :P Actually, I do consider myself a car enthusiast. I'm just not a true expert

That's a good news. However yes, I thought about some moisture too. Will be totally removed.

You mean to clean it and reorder it to seems new?

Hope it means "it looks good overall"

Is it a removable piece? A kinda small metal cilinder?
Is it common for it to get rusted?

Actually I put some pictures before the anti-rust. Unfortunately it was given to me by the repairman friend of the friend of mine, without telling me the name. I'll ask him. It was composed by two very dense liquids parts that had to be mixed together in order to activate it and then attaching it over the metal/rust. It dries in 24 hours.


About the jack up spots, I'll tell this to the mechanic. Thanks!

I have some last pictures to help evaluating under the chassis:

Scorpner

iTrader: (4)

You're welcome.
Yes, from what I can see.

Yes, IMO it should be removed so that you can remove the rust, treat it, and put it back together. You may even be able to replace the drain plug.
It's not really a cylinder, click on the link to see how it goes together: http://lmgtfy.com/?q=Camaro+Floor+Pa...n+Plugs+images

Ok, it sounds like they used a two part epoxy type of protectant.

Yes, that is a good idea.

FirebirdUSX

Yes because these cars will go up in value and you better keep it as stock looking as possible.If you upgrade something keep the original part (ex. radio).

Well you could (since there will be welding and you dont have the carpet in ) install some subframe connectors.That basically conects all frame parts (its under the car) and makes the chasis even more stiff.That improves acceleration ,fuel economy (suspensions works less) ,no more rattles and it makes the car behave well in crashes .It won't devalue the car because I'm pretty sure you can buy subframe connectors from GM itself ....and most important you can jack up the car after that anywhere you want on the subframe connector iteself.

this is subframe connector http://umiperformance.com/catalog/im...2400ae_LRG.jpg

NiG

Thanks guys

I had already saw those subframe connectors. But I thought they were useless in my case. Actually, what are they disegned for? I even thought they would make the car weighter. Not good.

thanks!

FirebirdUSX

They won't add much weight.Their role is to remove body flex.Even if the car looks stiff while you drive (especially a engine with alot of torque) the body will flex and the suspension will have to work more to compensate for that flex.With them the car will accelerate faster because it will have better grip ,sometimes it even helps with gas mileage or in case of a crash it keeps the passanger compartment intact .They won't devalue the car because I'm pretty sure even GM performance parts or how is that called sells them .They are a known upgrade for muscle cars.

Also (your mechanic will love this part ) adding subframe connectors allows you to jack up the car anywhere you like on them.