Rusting door :(

noog

Hey there, Bought a '97 VW Polo about a month ago, it's in damn good condition (only 30k on the clock) but the drivers door has rust damage

Take a look at the picture. There's that damage, and a few bubbles in the paintwork in the same area... Sills etc are fine.

What's the best plan of attack to get rid of this unsightly rust? It doesn't have to look 100% factory perfect, but aslong as it's not immediately noticable I'll be very happy.

Cheers in advance

dahamsta

Rust is very hard to get rid of permanently, you'd really need to cut it out completely and weld in new metal; and then of course it would have to be painted. However you should get another door from a scrapper for €150, and if it's the same colour it won't need to be painted -- your door isn't going to fall off (unless the hinges are rusting too) so you can afford to wait for a good one.

adam

Hotwheels

From the picture it looks like its eaten thru the metal, you'll have to sand it anyway to see the how much damage there is. You could have a go at filling it. If you are handy at DIY, and painting it afterwards..
A self adhesive strip (go faster strip)could be applied afterwards to the bottom on both sides of the car to hide any discrepancies between paint colours..

noog

I dont *think* the rust has eaten a hole in the door, the paint is flaking away...

I'll sand the rust down with some bog standard sand paper and take another picture.

Cheers:)

noog

I sanded all the rust bubbles off with sandpaper and a power sander and pretty much took it down to shiney metal, it's very smooth now

A friend told me to rub rubbing compound into it a bit and then use smooth white hammerite on it. Will post a pic when i've done more to it. feel free to suggest things incase i'm making some kinda mistake.

maidhc

Galvafroid is a much better rust proofing paint than hammerite. You must go down to the bare metal though, no point otherwise.

noog

Changed my mind. I'm going to get some filler primer and spray it on so it conceals the ridge between the bare metal and paint, and then mask everything except the bottom half of the car and (hopefully) get some VW paint and blend it in with the whole car.

Would KURUST do to treat the rust?

alias no.9

The thing that I'd worry about is the fact that the car will have been galvanised so it shouldn't rust. This means that this door could be a spurious replacement, indicating possible crash damage at some time.

Litcagral

Check that water isn't lodging (drain holes blocked) at the inside base of the door - used to be the main cause of rusting doors years ago.

noog

The guy i bought it from told me the rust was because of repairs to the door carried out about a year ago. I got a really good price for the car so I didn't expect it to be 100% mint condition.

Anyways, today I applied a coat of kurust, and gave it 3 coats of filler primer. Later i'll spray it with my VW paint

Here's a pic of it primed up and drying:

noog

Here it is painted with VW paint.. The finish looks matt, compared to the rest of the car, i'm going to use a bit of rubbing compound and try and match the shades a little better, do i need to put laquer on the paint to make it gloss up?

MercMad

The paint doesn't look like its the right colour. Where did you buy it ? Did yoiu match the colour codes ?

Better off taking the fuel filler off and going to a paintv auto factor who will give you an exact match in a spray can !

Give it about 4 light coats allowing drying in between and then go over it with fine 1000 grade sandpaper used wet !

BTW is this a UK imprted car ?

noog

Yeah, the paint does look a slightly diff shade, There were two shades of VW white at the place I went to get it, Maybe i got the wrong one!

I gave it 4 coats of the VW white that i bought, with 15 minute drying time between coats. would it be safe to put the different white over the top of the white I just put on?

and Yeah it's a UK car

Edit: just had a look at the paint code on the car and it says it's "LB9A" which is "Candy White".. I sprayed it with Alpine White. drat =(