Rust repair cost

[supton]

Have a patch of rust, about the size of a quarter, on my truck. Is there an eyeball estimate I can get, just so I know, before I go to a real body shop? I don't plan on doing a "good" repair, I just want good enough. You know, perfect from 20'. It's a 10 year old truck, after all, doesn't have that much longer to go.

This is on the roof, just above the windshield.

 

[StevieC]

Not that you need this level of repair but he has great tips in here that you can apply to your minor repair...

 

[Donald]

Looks like a rock ding that got worse.

They make a little pen like product that has fiberglass strands you can use to "sand". With sand paper you will make the area larger than it needs to be. With this you can "sand" a tiny area.

I would get it to bare metal and then prime and paint with an artists brush.

 

[supton]

Will those paint chip bottle paint stick better if I prime it? I'm ok with doing a little sanding, then shoot some primer onto cardboard, then transfer over with a Q-tip. Once dry then dab paint on. Just has to be good enough--I can only see this if I get on a ladder, like when washing.

 

[Kestas]

If you look closely, you can see the filiform corrosion tunneling its way under the paint and spreading out in all directions.

 

[Donald]

Originally Posted by supton
Will those paint chip bottle paint stick better if I prime it? I'm ok with doing a little sanding, then shoot some primer onto cardboard, then transfer over with a Q-tip. Once dry then dab paint on. Just has to be good enough--I can only see this if I get on a ladder, like when washing.


You need to prime. Shoot the primer into aluminum foil shaped to make a pouch. Flow it on with straightened paper clip drop by drop.

 

[khittner]

A 10yr. old Toyota truck with only 150K on it could be good for quite awhile (like another 10 years/150K miles) if you keep the rust at bay. If you intend to keep running it, you want to get to that rust before it migrates to the pinch welds around the windshield, compromises the glass seal, and causes a leak. It's worth a trip to a body shop that's willing to do rust repairs (many in the Rust Belt aren't willing to do this work), and get it fixed right. All of the rust needs to be ground down to bare metal, appropriately filled, primed, and then painted.

 

[ecotourist]

Sorry guys, plain paint or primer won't do it. The rust will just come right back.

I've had pretty good success by doing the following1) Get down to good metal all around the rust spot. (2) Sand or Grind off the surface rust. You'll still have rust in pits. (3) Convert the rust in those pits to iron phosphate using a phosphoric acid treatment. (4) Paint with POR15, then prime and paint.

You can get a kit with POR15 that contains the (presumably phosphoric acid based) rust converter. You have to keep it off your skin and out of your eyes of course. It is acid after all.

I did a repair over a decade ago using this approach and it's still good. I'm really obsessive about getting the rust out of the pits though. I think that's the secret to a long lasting repair.

 

[Railrust]

Originally Posted by khittner
A 10yr. old Toyota truck with only 150K on it could be good for quite awhile (like another 10 years/150K miles) if you keep the rust at bay. If you intend to keep running it, you want to get to that rust before it migrates to the pinch welds around the windshield, compromises the glass seal, and causes a leak. It's worth a trip to a body shop that's willing to do rust repairs (many in the Rust Belt aren't willing to do this work), and get it fixed right. All of the rust needs to be ground down to bare metal, appropriately filled, primed, and then painted.


You're right about rust repairs in the rust belt, it seems to be an industry trend right now...I've heard more than one guy tell me they don't touch rust anymore. That it's a waste of time, just comes back. I imagine that's got to be a pain if you work in autobody...you do the repair...rust comes back...customer comes back and blames you. You fix it again and that guy tells everyone he knows that you didn't do it right the first time. Bad for business

 

[Ws6]

Originally Posted by supton
Have a patch of rust, about the size of a quarter, on my truck. Is there an eyeball estimate I can get, just so I know, before I go to a real body shop? I don't plan on doing a "good" repair, I just want good enough. You know, perfect from 20'. It's a 10 year old truck, after all, doesn't have that much longer to go.

This is on the roof, just above the windshield.


Similar cost me $300 on my Jeep Grand Cherokee, and it was 10" perfect. The repair shop refused to do shoddy or less than perfect work, and re-painted about a 24" area of the roof to properly blend the black metallic paint to make it perfect. I hated paying, but it WAS OEM perfect.

 

[klt1986]

No reason why that truck will not go at least another 10 years and 150k more miles.....unless you are just wanting something new or newer. About 5 years ago a tractor/trailer threw something up from the trailer tires and hit the roof of my wife's 08 Honda CR-V, knocking a chip of paint about the size of a 50 cent piece off. Since it was on the roof I thought about "fixing" it myself but never got around to it and the spot doubled in size over the next year and a half. I wound up having the local high school auto body class fix it for $100. Of course ours did not develop any rust and I was happy with their work in this situation. You might check into that if you just want it fixed.

 

[caprice_2nv]

Originally Posted by StevieC
Not that you need this level of repair but he has great tips in here that you can apply to your minor repair...





Thanks for posting that. I will be using that to help with my body work this spring on my Caprice.

 

[supton]

Originally Posted by Ws6

Similar cost me $300 on my Jeep Grand Cherokee, and it was 10" perfect.

$300, I'd be fine with that.

Originally Posted by klt1986
No reason why that truck will not go at least another 10 years and 150k more miles

I dunno, that seems like high expectations. As I've come to find out, a starter replacement is $1k, and a transmission is 4 or 5 k. I don't know what I want to replace this truck with, that would be lower cost yet retain the 3,500lb towing that I'd like, but I know I don't want to keep much longer, as it's on the downslope of life. Everything wears out, and there's nothing fancy about this truck. I've kept rust low underneath but it's already lost one caliper and who knows what is next--it's a Toyota, it's well on its way to rusting something out.

 

[jeepman3071]

The only advice I can offer is get estimates from a couple different shops. In some cases you will be amazed at the wide range you get.

 

[Lubener]

Originally Posted by supton
Have a patch of rust, about the size of a quarter, on my truck. Is there an eyeball estimate I can get, just so I know, before I go to a real body shop? I don't plan on doing a "good" repair, I just want good enough. You know, perfect from 20'. It's a 10 year old truck, after all, doesn't have that much longer to go.

This is on the roof, just above the windshield.

Get off your keester and get some local estimates. You are wasting your time asking, no way to accurately guess with a pic.

 

[supton]

Originally Posted by Lubener
Originally Posted by supton
Have a patch of rust, about the size of a quarter, on my truck. Is there an eyeball estimate I can get, just so I know, before I go to a real body shop? I don't plan on doing a "good" repair, I just want good enough. You know, perfect from 20'. It's a 10 year old truck, after all, doesn't have that much longer to go.

This is on the roof, just above the windshield.

Get off your keester and get some local estimates. You are wasting your time asking, no way to accurately guess with a pic.

Fair enough--just wanted a rough idea before I take a day or two off from work to go to shops. I figure, it's a half day per shop to get a quote--wanted to know if it was above or below my threshold of pain.

 

[JTK]

There's a guy on a Ram forum I follow that claims he's tried a few body shops in his area (MA) to repair a similar spot on a rear quarter of his 2012 Ram 1500 and they won't even throw him an 'I don't want the job' estimate. I'd like to think that's an odd ball experience, but just tossing that out there.

The clip that StevieC shared is a great one, although that kid probably has $300 worth of supplies there if you were starting from nothing.

Given the cost of paint and labor these days, I can't see that roof repair being less than $300-500 at a shop. If it were a car I could keep laid-up for days, I'd try something like the above video, or the POR15 suggestion.

 

[klt1986]

Originally Posted by supton
Originally Posted by Ws6

Similar cost me $300 on my Jeep Grand Cherokee, and it was 10" perfect.

$300, I'd be fine with that.

Originally Posted by klt1986
No reason why that truck will not go at least another 10 years and 150k more miles

I dunno, that seems like high expectations. As I've come to find out, a starter replacement is $1k, and a transmission is 4 or 5 k. I don't know what I want to replace this truck with, that would be lower cost yet retain the 3,500lb towing that I'd like, but I know I don't want to keep much longer, as it's on the downslope of life. Everything wears out, and there's nothing fancy about this truck. I've kept rust low underneath but it's already lost one caliper and who knows what is next--it's a Toyota, it's well on its way to rusting something out.


Guess I'm not accustomed to vehicles rusting to that extent. My 11 Tundra is rust free. My brother in law has a 99 Tacoma with 195k miles that is still in excellent shape. Has some rust on the rear bumper where someone hit it several years back and the spare tire cable rusted in two back in the summer. Last fall the factory muffler rusted out but the rest of the exhaust is still original.

 

[supton]

Yep, welcome to New England. If you want to have some fun, flip through our Craigslist to see some rotbuckets.

Plus, in the end, 150k is 150k. No one knows how long a transmission will last, and I keep reading how that is average lifespan for an automatic. My truck was bought used, so I have no idea how hard it was driven--when I drop the pan, it looked ok in there, but... In the end, it's an automatic, it's a wear item. Nothing lasts forever.

 

[Drakus]

I usually remove the rust on the car myself. I have Mitsubishi Triton 2006 and it already has rust in places. I usually use The Tool Scout such as circular saw, sandpaper and so on. if the area of rust is large, then i just cut out this area and weld a new piece of metal to it. But all the same, the car did not have to work for long because it is a working car and it has already drove more than 500 thousand miles.