AE82 Rust

[Cin]

Hi,

I have a 1988 AE82 CSX. 4AC engine. Odo = 125000km. I need some help to decide whether the rust would be worth repairing or whether I should take it to the wreckers. I have no flippin idea about cars but after spending the last 2 days reading the forums, I feel pretty keen on learning to fix her up.

Note: If the rust can be managed, I plan on converting from 4AC to 4AGE 16V or Silver Top. Yess...I'm another wannabe backyard mechanic.

Dent in the left door. I left it like that for more than 4yrs now
http://www.flickr.com/photos/cinrolla/3503437623/

Rust in both corners
http://www.flickr.com/photos/cinrolla/3504250170

http://www.flickr.com/photos/cinrolla/3503437245

http://www.flickr.com/photos/cinrolla/3503436793

http://www.flickr.com/photos/cinrolla/3503436495

http://www.flickr.com/photos/cinrolla/3504248694

Dent in the rear guard. Note the key marks.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/cinrolla/3503435151

This is underneath the black plastic cover. I removed it because it broke in two.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/cinrolla/3504247606

Driver's door. There are lots of key marks down the whole driver's side.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/cinrolla/3503434531

Thanks,

Cin

[ian]

hi cin
there is a fair amount of work there
it depends on how much you can do yourself
there are tafe courses on resto work that are invaluable
or else get a rust free body and start from there
if you look in the toyota f/sale section my son has an ae 82 manual in very good condition he is not asking much for it ,is your car your daily driver ? cos if it is limit your repairs to a small section at a time , use a good quality filler
and if the rust goes right through, use fibreglass filler [fibrefill],if you have a look on the tech thread there is fairly comprehensive advice available ,
good luck with it
ian

[Shifty]

Rust repairs are best done properly, personally I would have a go at repairing the minor rust on the C-Pillar but I would probably leave the fuel tank repair to a panel shop or rust repairer to make sure it's done well. A poorly repaired rust section will come back ten times as bad, and a lot faster than you would think!

As has been said before, attack it a little piece at a time, rather than pulling the whole car to bits or it will be too daunting and you'll end up giving up on it. Instead, focus on one little area like the C-pillar and see how you go with that first. The best thing is that it's covered by a plastic bit so the result doesn't have to be 100% perfect as long as you repair the rust itself properly.

I'm no rust repair expert but basically you want to get rid of all traces of rust (a wire wheel on a drill is pribably a good start), coat the bare metal with primer and then some paint. All this stuff will be available from supercheap/autobarn.

As for painting the whole car, it is a time consuming process and you need to be very committed. Anyone can do it, but you will probably spend weeks and weeks sanding the car before you even put a drop of paint on it!

[Cin]

hi cin
there is a fair amount of work there
it depends on how much you can do yourself

I'm now going to try repair some of the rust myself but will get a quote for the rest. I just need to work out which repairs should be done by a pro.

there are tafe courses on resto work that are invaluable
or else get a rust free body and start from there

I did a search on TAFE NSW (where I live) and it came up with a few results. One of the courses was what I was looking for but the costs ($1400) are out of question for me.

if you look in the toyota f/sale section my son has an ae 82 manual in very good condition he is not asking much for it ,

I saw the ad and it looks very tempting, but for sentimental reasons I want to try to keep onto the one I have.

is your car your daily driver ? cos if it is limit your repairs to a small section at a time , use a good quality filler

No, fortunately not, but if I can repair it then I can imagine driving it on a daily basis. If that makes any sense

and if the rust goes right through, use fibreglass filler [fibrefill],if you have a look on the tech thread there is fairly comprehensive advice available ,
good luck with it
ian

I'm off to buy a fibreglass repair kit now and will give an update on any progress later on.

Thanks for your advice Ian. +1 rep

[Cin]

Rust repairs are best done properly, personally I would have a go at repairing the minor rust on the C-Pillar but I would probably leave the fuel tank repair to a panel shop or rust repairer to make sure it's done well. A poorly repaired rust section will come back ten times as bad, and a lot faster than you would think!

I will get a quote for repairing the A-Pillar and the petrol tank. Would you know a ball park figure on the cost of such a repair job?

As has been said before, attack it a little piece at a time, rather than pulling the whole car to bits or it will be too daunting and you'll end up giving up on it. Instead, focus on one little area like the C-pillar and see how you go with that first. The best thing is that it's covered by a plastic bit so the result doesn't have to be 100% perfect as long as you repair the rust itself properly.

I will give this a go today. I totally agree with attacking it a little piece at a time. I would probably give up if I tried to start the repairs on all fronts at once.

I'm no rust repair expert but basically you want to get rid of all traces of rust (a wire wheel on a drill is pribably a good start), coat the bare metal with primer and then some paint. All this stuff will be available from supercheap/autobarn.

As for painting the whole car, it is a time consuming process and you need to be very committed. Anyone can do it, but you will probably spend weeks and weeks sanding the car before you even put a drop of paint on it!

Is it ok to have primer on there for a long period of time without risking damage to the metal? I read somewhere that primer is porous. I'm asking just in case I strip to bare metal, prime, then for any reason I have to wait a few weeks to paint it properly.

Thanks Shifty! +1 rep

[Shifty]

I wouldn't leave something in primer long-term, I've seen primed metal develop a little rust so I'm not sure if that was because the surface wasn't clean enough (use wax & grease remover first), the primer wasn't applied correctly (follow directions on can), or perhaps as you said the primer is, to a degree, porous so moisture can get through.

[Shifty]

If it helps, I just did some basic rust repair on my AE82 today.

The culprit


Cleaned up all traces of rust with a wire wheel on a drill, then with a small grinding bit on my Dremel. Don't be lazy here, the more rust you get rid of the less chance there is of it coming back and time soon.


Treated with rust converter & primer as per instructions. Again don't be lazy, the better the job is the longer it will last.


The repair was then completed with structural metal filler, rather than just covering over the existing rust with cheap 'bog'.


As I was doing it all properly it took me a good few hours to get to the finish so I just gave it a quick 'brush touch' from an off-the-shelf colour-matched tube and I will give it a proper sand back & paint at a later stage so that it doesn't look too dodgy.

As you can see though, it looks pretty good from a distance