Current Rust Protection Tech; Possible to Daily an 80s Japanese Car Year-Round in the Rust Belt?

JG's recent underbody painting adventure, my recent experiences with Fluid Film, and a long list of now-dead 80s cars in my past have me wondering this.  If you really went all-out on rust protection, would it be possible to drive something like a mid-late 80s Toyota or Mazda indefinitely in salt country?  Anybody have direct experience with this?  I touch up the paint on the underside of my MR2 annually, but it also gets put away when the salt flies- so far so good on that one.

If GRM wants to do a long term test on this experiment there's an 84 Supra I'll buy tomorrow.

I've had good luck with Fluid Film but it does need to get reapplied each year.  Maybe a serious undercoating job by one of the professional folks that warranty it?

See the Miata with the red hardtop in the background? That gets driven all winter every winter, the owner says that regular and aggressively maintained anti-rust treatment keeps it alive.

I fluid film my truck, so far so good. Also big mud flaps seem to help.

I had a 1980 Mazda from new.  It was rustproofed from the dealer, I maintained it meticulously, and I never drove it in winter, and even so it still rusted aggressively.  Of any cars, I'd say ones from that era are going to be the worst offenders.

In reply to ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ :

Short answer is  No. longer answer is possibly with regular application and diligent washing you might be able to get as much as a decade before fenders and doors start flapping.   But some parts you'll just need to regularly replace.  Brake lines.  And buy loaded calipers when it's time for brake work.  I have tried to carefully rebuild rust damaged ones  but between wear and the heat of braking .  Pistons will stick, pins will rust freezing caliper movement.  Etc.  

Nope. Slow death. Salt finds a way.

If you can get rustproofing into doors and every other cavity, touch up all paint (including the undercarriage) and then rustproof the whole undercarriage, you'll at least greatly extend its life.  This treatment has to be redone annually after a good cleaning, and areas in the path of direct wheel spray will need to be monitored to make sure that rustproofing, paint, etc. isn't wearing through. 

I'm daily-ing a '97 M3 in Cleveland. My strategy was to start with one that wasn't perfect to begin with and then keep it as nice as I can so I'm not destroying a perfect one because in my experience, salt just ends up winning somehow. It's totally rust free underneath but has a small spot in front of the right rear. 

I had it fluid filmed and clean it as often as I can. I'm considering trying out the Ammo anti-salt, waterless wash because I don't have heat in the garage and am guessing February won't present an opportunity to wash it.

I also figure that I'm going to have to repair it should I continue driving it through winters. 

Yes you can DD it if you are willing to put in the time.  Do you have a lift in the garage so you can get under it with a light and check every crevice?  Do you have a washing process that will work when it is on a lift?  Are you willing to spend the time to do this every month/week/whatever needed to keep salt off the bottom?  No rust preventative lasts forever and on a pregalvanized steel car rust can start very quickly.  

Short answer: No.

Long answer: Hell no.

I bought a rust free car from Wisconsin and it started rusting out just from the ambient salt in the air, because I refused to drive it in the winter.

The best rust protection is a sacrificial anode called "winter car".  Volvo made the best ones for this.

porschenut said:

Yes you can DD it if you are willing to put in the time.  Do you have a lift in the garage so you can get under it with a light and check every crevice?  Do you have a washing process that will work when it is on a lift?  Are you willing to spend the time to do this every month/week/whatever needed to keep salt off the bottom?  No rust preventative lasts forever and on a pregalvanized steel car rust can start very quickly.  

The OP is one of the few people I know who probably would actually be able to say YES to most of those things, lol.

However, I'm surprised (based on your username) that you didn't ask "Do you have a 1980s Porsche?"....which is very likely the least likely car make from the 80s to rust (though of course they will eventually too, and things like brake lines and some suspension parts, of course, are still vulnerable). 

Fluid film worked pretty well, but the best answer is of course "beater with a heater"

Unless there is an attempt to prove a point or "just cause" doesnt matter to save a car in the salt because the resale will suck regardless of how well it was rustproofed.  Just get your beater and then the nice car is "stored in a heated garage, never seen salt"

Heck I'm trying to figure out how to preserve a 2003 Subaru in the south......  that is garaged.  

In reply to ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ :

My neighbor in Wisconsin had a 1948 Chevy Pickup that was rust free.  This was in the mid 1970's. 
   This is what he did. He retired from the railroad and bought an  old steam Generator. 

.  The truck was kept in a garage and when he drove in steam was sprayed from underneath.  And all around.  He'd go in and wash the truck. With warm water.  Then dry it completely from the boiler heat.  
Once a week he'd paste wax it.  Including crawling underneath to wax the chassis.   Maintenance  was methodical and exact.   
     But that truck looked better than it did when it was brand new.  
 I suspect he averaged 10 hours a week just on the truck. 

I've fluid filmed a ball hitch left on all winter and it still rusted bad in just 1 winter.

In reply to twowheeled :

Spot weld three or four sheets of steel together, with lackadaisical prep before welding, for a better shot at the Japanese experience.

The salt gets into all the poorly protected crevices and really goes to town. 

Pete. (l33t FS) said:

I bought a rust free car from Wisconsin...

 

I live in Wisconsin.  There is no such thing.  

FSP_ZX2 said:

Pete. (l33t FS) said:

I bought a rust free car from Wisconsin...

 

I live in Wisconsin.  There is no such thing.  

It had corners on all the fenders and all the bolts had threads!

15 years later, I could not tell you where it was other than 12 hours from Cleveland.  Well up into the middle of the state. 

I figure nobody drove an RX-7 in the winter there.

Just adding here. I went through a car wash earlier this week to get salt off the paint. Woke up this morning to 2-3 inches on the ground and salt already on the roads. After dropping my daughter at school I just gently wiped down the trouble areas. Will it actually help? Probably not but it's something. 

It's a losing battle but I've decided it's a worthwhile battle to have a daily driver I really like when I don't really have space for a separate winter beater at the moment and don't want to pay to store yet another car. 

My 8.1 suburban came from California and is as rust free as they come anymore. I woolwaxed the whole thing - it looks worse but seems to be more effective than fluid film. Did the inside of all the rockers and everything, so I'm hoping to get a good long life out of it. But even after just a year of driving in the midwest, there are some bits that are corroded just from humidity like the gas and brake pedal arms, for example. Weird.

I may keep the K1500 around just as a winter beater around town, but I'm undecided on that since my current fleet of 7 cars is more than I can handle.