I just bought a new ef hatch, the body is pretty clean, it just has one spot of rust, on the passenger side corner. I took a screwdriver and pulled away the rusted metal, im not sure if it is all the way through yet. But if the metal does have to be cut out and new metal welded how much would the average body shop charge without paint? I plan on building a clean hatch, i am buying new OEM bumpers and side mouldings, and i alreadly have someone to paint it.

 

My suggestion is to fix it your self, unless you are planning on getting you car repainted. All you need is a Paint scaper, painters tape, sanding block, 100-400 grit sand paper, bondo, and bondo clay(red stuff). It must be done, in temps above 55 degrees, so either in the garage or in the spring. Any questions let me know, and to answer your question, ~$250-$300. And the price to DIY is less than $75. good luck

 

yes professionally will be in the 300's, but if you are gonna build this car and keep it awhile I recommend just spending the money and getting it fixed the right way, I once payed a shop to professionally fix my rust and they did it cheap with bondo, needless to say, the rust spots started to show a little bubbling up after only a year

 

a spot like that i'd say fix it yourself. i do bodywork for a living and its not all that hard. And if you think by paying a shop to do it your getting it done the right way then your wrong, most shops are just gonna see your money and ship that car right back out as soon as they can. I say do it yourself because either way you do it theres gonna be plastic on your car, whether you just grind and fill or cut it out, weld in new metal its still gonna need just as much plastic work. the problem is just grinding it out and filling your probrably not gonna get rid of all the rust, it'll rust again in the near future. If you choose to cut it out and weld in some sort of a patch panel that you've made it will probrably last a bit longer but will eventually also rust out again along your weld seem if you do not prep the back side of the panel correctly (most shops won't do this). replacing the whole quarter panel is an even worse idea because then your just opening up 10x more area for the potential of rust within a couple years if not done correctly. what i'd do is cut out all the rust, weld in your patch, then i'd por15 all the bare metal, take out your trim in the trunk to get to the inside of the quarter really nice, then do the rest of your metal work with some decent quality plastic. 80grit the plastic then 180 grit the putty coat, prime it, 320 block sand the primer, 500 grit soft block it, scuff up the rest of the quarter with a grey scotchbrite and your ready to go, don't forget to under coat the inside of the quarter after your por 15 it

 

"the body is pretty clean"

no, its ugly. why would u buy something with cancer?

the answer, sell it and buy something without rust.

 

thats not bad, he said that was the only spot of the car with rust, and its not even rotted through yet. whens the last time you saw a stock 15 year old honda without rust

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by shortyz21 &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">"the body is pretty clean"

no, its ugly. why would u buy something with cancer?

the answer, sell it and buy something without rust. </TD></TR></TABLE>

Well considering the car has no dents or dings, and the other side of the car is rust free, I only paid 1000.00 dollars for the car, i have had 4 ef's and they all had there rust problems, its getting harder and harder every day to find a rust free ef.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by godruler &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">a spot like that i'd say fix it yourself. i do bodywork for a living and its not all that hard. And if you think by paying a shop to do it your getting it done the right way then your wrong, most shops are just gonna see your money and ship that car right back out as soon as they can. I say do it yourself because either way you do it theres gonna be plastic on your car, whether you just grind and fill or cut it out, weld in new metal its still gonna need just as much plastic work. the problem is just grinding it out and filling your probrably not gonna get rid of all the rust, it'll rust again in the near future. If you choose to cut it out and weld in some sort of a patch panel that you've made it will probrably last a bit longer but will eventually also rust out again along your weld seem if you do not prep the back side of the panel correctly (most shops won't do this). replacing the whole quarter panel is an even worse idea because then your just opening up 10x more area for the potential of rust within a couple years if not done correctly. what i'd do is cut out all the rust, weld in your patch, then i'd por15 all the bare metal, take out your trim in the trunk to get to the inside of the quarter really nice, then do the rest of your metal work with some decent quality plastic. 80grit the plastic then 180 grit the putty coat, prime it, 320 block sand the primer, 500 grit soft block it, scuff up the rest of the quarter with a grey scotchbrite and your ready to go, don't forget to under coat the inside of the quarter after your por 15 it</TD></TR></TABLE>

^^^good info

i don't know much about bodywork, but i just removed all my dents and fixed all my rust. Followed the above procedure to a tee except i used 400 instead of 500.

Now about the por-15, wear gloves when you apply it. Takes 10 days for it to come off naturally.
the directions for por-15 say don't expose it to sunlight. What would happen if you exposed por-15 to sunlight for a while?

it will take less than 5 minutes to get all that rust off with a 18v drill w/3" wire wheel attachment. Try that and if there's any metal left, do what you have to do.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by shortyz21 &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">"the body is pretty clean"

no, its ugly. why would u buy something with cancer?

the answer, sell it and buy something without rust. </TD></TR></TABLE>


yea what he said and just throw every honda away thats got rust on the rear 1/4's

fix it up and save another hatch...

 

jesus christ, some people have never lived or even been up north id say

 

you dont even need to be up north. you guys dont wanna see the rust in my 1/4 that has doubled in size over the past 2-3 months.

 

it does'nt have any UV protection in it if you expose por 15 to sun for too long, just like basecoat, can't leave it without clear or it'll get burnt away eventually. either leave it in prime or base/clear it

 

and yes you can get away with base coating over 400 grit sandscratchs IF you are basing a solid color, or a color with very very very light metalics, other wise if you base a metalic color over 400 grit the metalics won't lay down properly, they'll stand up in the deeper scratches and highlight all the scratches.