b15

After a ton of asking questions, talking to members here, and browsing here through forums during the process, I completed my "rust repair on a budget"...I wanted to show you guys how everything turned out.

So, here's my story and what I did. I bought a 93 civic hatch from my now ex-girlfriend in August and I couldn't stand looking at the rust, but I was willing to deal with it til one of my f[]ckhead co-workers at autozone started breaking apart the rust on the quarter of the car (much worse than the first pics you'll see). Annoyed with him and the fact that every time I looked at it I'd get angry, I figured I'd dive in and try to get this fixed rather than look at it. Here's what I did, what I used, what it cost, and how you can repair rust on a budget. It may not be perminant. I know I will get a TON of haters saying the rust will return, but this is my experiment, and to make a long story short, I lost my job after I started breaking away the rust (I ordered new quarters so I figured whatever, I'd just start picking at it) and so I could not afford to weld the new quarters in after they arrived. The quotes I got from shops to weld in new quarters (patch panels from ebay) and put the car in filler and primer afterwards with NO paint were between $2200-3000. That's insane. Body shops suck, and people who won't return emails or phone calls suck even more. I tried about 10 times to hire someone just to do the sanding on my filler but even that was impossible, no one wanted to make money or help a guy on a budget.

The reason for this thread is so that I can show people that you can fix/repair/repaint rust areas for cheap that will at least hold up a little while so it can buy you some time to at least save more money before new metal needs to be welded in. I do not know the long term effects of my work as it's pretty recent but time will tell. It may be a wasted $105 but it was a learning experience and as long as the car is driveable and not in pieces or on jackstands in my barn I don't consider it a waste but a learning experience

I'd say the whole process was roughly 60 hours of labor but thats because I'm slow and like to make sure I dont make a mess when doing so and I like to learn along the way and inspect things over and over. The HARDEST part of the project was because the car was a custom paint by maaco so there was no paint code and no way to match the paint in a spray can. I just moved to Philly so I had no compressor to spray this (no 220 line here)

Materials and cost:
Fiberglass resin (free, had it laying around),
fiberglass mat (free),
body bumping hammer with pick ($8?)
lots of liquid hardener ($2 tube at AZ required 3 tubes)
long strand fiberglass filler by Bondo (Clearance at AZ $6 gallon) ,
metalfill by Bondo ($20 quart),
POR15 rust repair starter kit ($28 shipped),
lots of rubber gloves (free),
DA sander (had laying around),
Sanding discs ($4),
block sander ($5 pep boys),
bucket of water (free), sponge (free)
2000 + 1500 grit sand paper ($8 for 2 assortment packs),
19mm socket (free),
eye protection ($2 ACE hardware),
filler primer (had laying around),
spot putty ($4 tube used 1)
Duplicolor automotive spray paint ($6 pep boys),
Turtle Wax professional medium duty rubbing compound ($6 pep boys but i had some laying around),
black magic wax (first time using this, usually go with Zymol - FREE autozone was throwing out).
Spray professional undercoating $8 (bought at Pep Boys but AZ has a much better one for $10 I just refuse to shop there now since they are scum).


BEFORE




I don't have pics of everything but I'll try to just tell you what I did as best as possible. After these pics what I did was took all that rust bubbling and took the body hammer I bought and broke away all the old rust. Poke through everything you can. If your hammer goes through it, the metal was rusting anyway and would just re-rust. its not a bad thing to break rust away. after this, I sanded down the edges that were still strong but had some surface rust on them. This is when I got my hand caught on the jagged fender well metal and had to go to the doc and get a tetanus shot. Wear gloves. Thick gloves, when you decide to sand your wells. I also got a scar. haha.

At this point I put the car up on jack stands in my barn and took a good look at the inner fender wells. I broke out rust in them and rust behind the quarters you could not see externally from the car. I filled in any small holes in the fender well with metal fill, let dry,put some fiberglass filler on top of that for ***** and giggles and then I coated that with rubberized undercoating.

After everything was sanded down I coated the areas with the por15 degreaser, then "metal prep" by por15 and then finally the por15 paint which I put 3 coats on in each area needed. Use lots of this stuff if you can afford to. The more the better. This stuff is amazing. I coated the inner edges of the well too with por15 to prevent future rusting, not only in the areas of my repairs.

Now I had some huge holes in the body which had to be fixed. Sheet metal would be ideal but if you cant afford it you improvise. I fiberglassed every area with missing sheet metal but actually peeled some off because fiberglass was inappropriate and metal fill worked better.

I had to use roughly 6-7 patches of fiberglass in the worst area. it made for a hell of a sanding job but the most important part is durability not flexibility.

Once the fiberglass is sanded, you can apply fiberglass filler over top, or metal fill, as needed. I like to put fiberglass filler on top of fiberglass patches or areas that need strong enforcement, but then sometimes I'll put metalfill over that or in areas where I need to repair a broken piece of sheet metal. Sanding filler sucks. Its almost impossible for me to do. I'm no good at it, openly. Openly I'm not that good at body work but I try and thats all that matters to me.

After the fib. filler was applied over top of the fiberglass mat repair and sanded, and metalfill used for the smaller holes, and/or rebuilding of small sheet metal, it just needs to be fully sanded down so it can have primer put on top. I then masked off the car using newspaper covering the entire car besides the repair area. I did NOT use masking tape due to the lines it leaves on the old paint showing exactly where you did the repair. so thus, I like this method much better as it makes for a more seamless wetsand.

After this process was complete (masking) I primed it with 5 coats and applied 5 coats of duplicolor paint - I did not clear coat, much to the forum shagrin because I don't think Maaco who did this amazing, sexy, ugly custom color didn't clear their work either, so I didnt want to keep it standing out more.

And here's a pic of the finished product. It's not perfect, but I'm happy enough with it that I'd post this thread. I hope you'll appreciate the hard work and not flame b/c I don't know how to weld and couldnt afford $3000 worth of repairs on a $1300 car, haha. So, thanks for reading, if you're on a budget, want to sell a car with rust, or just want something better looking than a huge rust bubble, this is a good temp repair. [pics will be added tonight, working on gettin em posted]

MORE BEFORE SHOTS
Later removed this patch because metalfill worked better and contoured a better shape
POR15 on the well and around the patch
Removed this patch later, integrity was too weak. Rebuilt with metal fill.
UGH this was awful. before sanding, por15, etc etc









After 6-7 layers of patching. USE a DIE GRINDER to even the edges of fiberglass and make them straight. If you ever get any holes/seams, fill with fiberglass filler.

AFTER SHOTS
I have some more pics of how the filler looked when I sanded it but due to my hard drive crashing on my comp I dont have them right now, I'll try to find them backed up somewhere.

Here's some of the finished results though (this was before waxing, but after polishing)







Hope you guys appreciate the hard work, it really was hell, and appreciate that sometimes on a budget we have to find different ways to fix things







Like I said im not very good at sanding but hey I tried...alot.. haha.
Only thing I'm dissappointed with is how the primer fades into the paint. I prob should have moved the paper back up a little and sprayed a couple more coats of the paint over that slight primer line. Surprized the buffer didnt take off the primer line. It did to some extent but not perfectly.
Thanks for the support

FearTheH

iTrader: (5)

No doubt that will eventually vibrate enough and crack out... And you will then have to put those quarters in... But like you said, when money is tight and you just need a temporary fix to buy some time until you can afford to have it done properly then why the hell not lol. It looks a hell of a lot better than before! I can't believe the shops up there are charging that much just to weld in quarters and do the filling...I'm living in the wrong area haha. But good job and kudos!

b15

thanks man i sure as hell hope it doesnt vibrate and crack out i may cry haha. I wish i knew a different demographic area may have been much cheaper. I wouldnt care if i had to drive to New Mexico to avoid paying 3,000 for that repair. Here's a big FU to NJ shops especially all craigslist ads for mobile auto body.

bakertime

iTrader: (1)

Well you're right that the rust WILL come back, but for your purposes and where you're at financially, I think you did a really decent job getting it presentable. More than that though, you didn't do an further damage like a lot of people doing this do, meaning then when you have the money to get it done right it won't end up costing much more then it would have this time around. Hopefully it lasts you for a little while!

And honestly, yeah that quote is a lot of money, but you now have a taste for just how much labor is involved in bodywork! The body shops have to make a profit too, so bodywork is inherently expensive.

b15

thanks Baker. I agree body work is the most time consuming thing in the world and is a very difficult skill. I call it a skill because its NOT easy at all and its NOT easy to learn, especially if you can't find a teacher, like I couldnt
You guys don't hold much faith in this POR15 stuff though do you? so far I'm living by it and confident that the rust won't return. I'm trying to keep the car off the salty winter roads here but its not gonna happen all the time. I'm really really crossing my fingers on the repair haha I'm praying it won't return.

bakertime

iTrader: (1)

Yeah, I mean POR is good for like a truck frame or something like that, but they don't call rust Cancer for nothing! It's just very difficult to get every little spot covered, not to mention that it can start again from the back or from another part of the fender arch.

The other thing is that the fiberglass doesn't have all that much to grab onto there without really overlapping onto a scuffed surface, so it may crack after being subjected to bumps and normal use. You may get lucky though, it seems that every now and then people have good luck with repairs like this.

b15

I should mention I used POR on both sides of the wheel well and also up inside the rusted seperated portion with a small brush . also on the back side of the side repairs. Hard to explain but I tried to use a lot to make sure it wouldn't return. Agreed though, it is sure cancerous.

b18cKoupe

Good effort, definately a big improvement. I wanted to be a bodyman until I worked at a shop for a year when I was 18. That was enough of that, a good body guy is extremely skilled and unfortunately charges accordingly.

b15

baker I did read your post and thats prob the only reason why I decided to keep this color instead of try to replace it with the $50 paint job

FearTheH

iTrader: (5)

Lol the 50 dollar paint job... You get what you pay for...especially so in automotive paint. People bring me cars to paint all the time that just came from maaco and other **** holes and said they paid 250 for it and are wondering why it looks like absolute **** haha. Like baker said, the fiberglass has nothing to properly adhere to, thus meaning it won't hold too long, but should hold long enough to save money to have it done. If you save up and are willing to drive you can bring it down here...or maybe after I do that write up you may even want to try it yourself. Just won't be going over quarter replacements, just minor/basic body work. Next time I get an old camaro or something from someone that needs quarters, ill do another write up but again, good job! And it does look far better than most first timers.

b15

thanks Fear
What do u think a QP replacement (cut out, weld in) plus bondo work should cost? no paint or primer
this car was painted by maaco previously, a lot of poor shoddy masking.

FearTheH

iTrader: (5)

For both quarters, depending on vehicle I usually charge around 500, but I'm not a body shop owner lol. They charge by the hour and the labor hours are set in a manual, if a manual says it takes 12 hours to do 2 quarter skins, and your employee does it in 6(just for example) at an average rate of 40 bucks per hour then that would be 240 bucks. However, where they make the big money is where the manual says its a 12 hour job, that's what you get billed for, 480 bucks. Again, just an example. If you're good, and productive then there's a lot of money that can be made. Its jacked up when you think about it, but 95% of people have no choice when they hit a deer, get in a fender bender, stray shopping carts, etc.. Lol. I still wouldn't expect quarters to run you 3000 bucks, around here you could get that, and the whole car painted but the labor rate is a lot more up north.

b15

holy hell batman, i would have paid 500 no questions asked

FearTheH

iTrader: (5)

Lol I would imagine so after being told 3000 haha... That's literally highway robbery!

Psychoteen101

500 is really cheap for both sides.

Your talking, labor for cutting out old panel, fabbin the new panel to fit, fitting and welding, bondo work, then prep and paint, plus all the materials youll need. $500 is nothing. Hell i spent $250 just on epoxy primer, which i also needed high build, hardener, reducer, paint and clear. Which is all expensive unless your buying cheap crap.

I can completely understand the $3,000 quote. You also have to think, they are gonna make it look good. It is extremely complicated to match factory paint, especially 15+ yr old paint. Most places would paint the entire car over or paint the entire side of the car, which is also a large amount of labor and supplies.

FearTheH

iTrader: (5)

Color matching old paint isn't hard. I've got a full swatch book of pretty much every color since 1972 along with fade swatches that go out 10 faded shades... If its past 10 you need to repaint it anyways... I really don't like mine going past 3 lol. I don't use anything cheap though, "you get what you pay for", but like I said before I do this for fun, not to make a killing in profit, if I profited 150-200 bucks I'd still be more than happy. I just like the work along with somethin to do when I'm bored off my ***

Psychoteen101

^^ Yea true that. I do it for the fun and for the experience.

Meister vtec

I did my masters in Toronto=lots of snow=lots of salt=lots of cancer for an eg.

I did exactly the same repair with fiberglass(on even a worse surface,lots of rust) and it held pretty damn good for over the 2 years that I was there for!

whats very important (what I was told) is that you use exactly the amount of hardener as your told in the instructions plus do it on a hot day or atleast in a hot area,I had none so I used a hair drier which worked I got no bubbles or cracks

b15

how did it hold up after u got out of Canada or did you sell the car? see this IS promising what i like to do as a rule of thumb is to drip fiberglass hardener across the patch/resin and then mix and blend it in with a finger, flip over, put about 2 more drips and smooth the hardener in by hand. I like liquid hardner much better than cream

honda22b18

wow. thats really useful.

hoffmanb16

I am in the middle of my own por-15 rust fix job and I don't wanna be a jerk ( cause that seems to be all you get on here ) but one thing you should have done that may haunt you is strip the paint around the area a good 3 cm, por-15 should never be put over paint and it would allow the fiber glass to stick to metal and not just half a cm of painted steel, that fiber glass is now sticking to a layer of paint and that paint under a little bit of stress might chip off and now your fiber glass will be sticking to nothing.

hoffmanb16

and if you striped the paint a bit you would have allot more room to paint your por 15 hence more protection.....

here is a link to my thread:

http://www.kelownacivics.com/forum/u...read#Post11401

the first pic there I ended up striping the paint back another 2cm to get to fresh steal.

ek747

Thanks, this was a real education.

kobe5

Great stuff, I was thinking of do this to my 94 accord, damn honda cancer. Thanks b15, game me some assurance that this will work with the help of POR15. Again great work

ken9

That how my car look but i have more rust on that car..I wouldn't any those kitty on your skin because it would make itch all day long...