I need to clean up a truck frame so I can paint it and preserve it a bit longer. Its lasted all these years, with a coat of paint it will outlast the owner, and still look pretty good. Sandblasting is not an option, I don't have the equipment, or a place I can do it myself. I don't need a sandbox outside my garage, and I doubt the neighbors would like it much either. Also, the funding is not available to have someone else do it for me. The frame is solid with heavy surface rust and some pitting in some spots, and light surface rust in other spots. I'm not too concerned about getting the pits out, I'd just like to smooth it out a bit and get some paint on it, the sole purpose will be to preserve it longer. The paint will be an oil base enamel. I have the frame pretty bare right now with the sheet metal and motor/trans off of it (the suspension is still there and the frame rolls). The frame will not be visible once the truck is reassembled. I've taken a grinder and gotten some of the worst parts down to smooth enough for my purpose and will probably hit those places with a 50 grit sander to level it off before clean up and paint. Its pretty obvious the grinder will leave some places that I can not get, like around the frame rivets and crossmember joints and inside the rails. Is there something else that will accomplish the task before me other then the grinder? Gene
I have some early mach up pictures, the frame is a bit off topic. I just want to clean this up and get some paint on it. The last picture is the cab I ended up using, and will be in the direction the finished product will be. I don't have up to date pictures. The cab is lower, the box will be lower, and there are filler pieces under the box sides. The use of fenders is still up in the air, the ones pictured are very rough. It will eventually have paint. Gene
Rust oleum rusty metal primer works well. The oils seep into the rust and grab. Clean all you can reach and brush/roll it on. You may want to buy it in quart containers, gallon cans of some paint products sometimes have low VOCs. So the formula is not the same.
Do you have a pressure washer that's over 2500 PSI? It'll knock off a lot of scale and blast any grease/oil out of the way as well. Surprising how well it works. Rinse the mess away when you're done since iron oxide (rust) won't hurt your lawn.
X2 on the needle scaler. I use one from harbor freight and man, that thing just chews up the rust. I have a large compressor though.
I knocked all the rivets out of my '35 ford frame, wire wheeled all the parts with my angle grinder, straightened via heat and beat, and re riveted. I used Rustoleum rusty metal primer. I used wire wheels from Harbor Freight, the whole pack was about $14. I was too poor to have it blasted, but I wish I could have as wire wheeling was time consuming and not fun. I was going to use POR 15, but I got under a buddies Javelin that he wire wheeled with a drill and spray painted in the early eighties with crappy K Mart paint and it still looked good, even after years of dirt floor storage. *edit: Ospho, I forgot to mention I Ospho-ed it. Kids were climbing on me, I couldn't think straight. Sent from my iPhone using H.A.M.B.
The needle scaler is a good suggestion, especially for larger areas, but a small (as in 1" diameter wire wheel for your drill motor is great for those small tight spots. It's all a mess as you most likely know! Mask and goggles are required when you get your face right in there!
Nothing is going to clean the frame like sandblasting,HF sells a cheap bucket siphon type blasting kit that works although it is time consuming due to working from a 5 gallon bucket. HRP
POR-15 is your clear answer. First, you use their rust remover, which is clear - spray it on. After a few minutes, your frame will turn white, turning the rust into a primer, which becomes an adhesion for the Black POR-15. The POR-15 is simply applied with a BRUSH, making this process that much easier! Just do your best NOT to get this paint on your skin. And whenever you need to get to any stopping point, clean the paint off of the cover, otherwise you will have a tough time getting the lid off the paint can. What is so fantastic about POR-15 is that this paint looks like you sprayed it on, even though you use a BRUSH. I painted my original '31 rails with POR-15 way back in 1996 and has not one speck of rust since!! Sent from my SM-G955U using The H.A.M.B. mobile app
I have used a product from SEM called Rutst Mort. Stuff works to neutralize the rust you can't get off. Did the same thing on my 53 GMC and used an industrial acrylic enamel paint on the frame. 25 years ago and it still looks great and I have to drive 1.5 miles on gravel before I get to pavement. Sent from my SM-G920W8 using The H.A.M.B. mobile app
the cheap way is take your angle grinder with a 5/8 arbor and go to one of your local hardware stores and buy a twisted wire wheel . I strip rust and paint all the time with one. Wear eye protection and gloves and a long sleeve shirt as some times a wire will come out stick you. They cost about 6 bucks and last a long time. Won't hurt sheetmetal when stripping paint. Stripped my whole Morris Minor with one wheel.
Use a pressure washer to remove the built up rust scale and grease, then make up a paste from white vinegar and baking soda, apply with a brush, let sit over night and pressure wash it again. Has worked for me on smaller than a truck frame projects.
I found an Eastwood sandblaster listed for $100. It was older but never used. The seal was shot. I bought a piece of rubber and made my own in 5 minutes. I've used the cheap bucket ones before.........they might work for small parts but I'm not going to do a frame. I went to a place that blasts and they had some piles of the media they use (I forget what it was, it's black). Sand is a bit of a pain. When a bag busted they just went to the next bag. I got two 5 gallon buckets full of the stuff for nothing. I'll never use sand again. There really wasn't much of a mess. I did it outside. So it costs me $100 and I would hate to think that I would have had to do it any other way.
I'm not a chemist, but I have been told that rust happens when the PH gets too high and yes it would act as a neutralizer I'm assuming the acid level in the vinegar helps dissolve the rust, I know painters use it to etch galvanized surfaces to make paint stick. Maybe another Hamber with more knowledge can chime in. As stated you can't out do sand blasting, but this method seems to work pretty good. I did some old rusted iron gates a few years ago and it produced good results, good enough for paint.
Old thread but crap why the hell spend three or four hundred bucks on maybe it will work crap or renting or buying tools to not spend 100 to 200 to have the frame sandblasted right? I've got a Sears Craftsman sandblaster that actually works pretty good with my 100 buck HF air compressor. You get a lot of breaks while the air builds up again but it will clean rust, paint and what not but that 45. bucks might be better spent towards having someone sand blast it. Having the frame sandblasted may mean that you have to drink the cheap beer for a month or two or give up the higher price burger place for lunch for that time frame but later down the road you will be hell for glad you did it rather than cut that corner.
Sand blasting is absolutely not an option here. I bought a needle scalar at our local Menard's for $36 + tax, almost $10 cheaper then Harbor Fright, and it was in stock. I spent a good 10-12 hours with my new toy, and cleaned up the frame good enough for my purposes. Then I got my el-cheapo spray gun out and applied a coat of Anti-rust semi gloss black. It looks good to me, and will serve my purposes well. I have run new fuel and brake lines on the frame and I have reinstalled the motor & trans. I have now moved on to the fixing the truck cab, while its off the frame. I bought one of those stripping wheels you put into a drill to remove most of the rust on the cab. One wheel did the whole cab. That was another 2 day long mess. Then I wiped down the cab and brushed on some rust converter. I have welded in most of the patches the cab needs, the only areas left are a few small holes above the windshield (which may be the hardest area to do). When I get done with that, I will DA the cab, and cover it with gray primmer, as per instructions on the rust converter label. Then I will do as much body work as I can stand (about 2-3 days worth), and prime it again. I need to at least get the firewall and the back of the cab in paint so the cab can go back on the frame. I need to get this thing back together so it rolls as a unit, and the motor can be covered, before the weather turns, which could happen any time after the end of Oct. This is the time of the year when I usually get pretty busy, I might actually be buried with work and might not get back to the truck before the weather gets bad. I don't have the luxury of taking my time to make it pretty. If I can make it mobile, and have it move under its own power, I may be able to work on it through the winter. If it gets snow bound, I'm done until spring. I'll try to get some updated pictures. Gene
A flapper disc on a grinder and a wire wheel for tight spots. Sent from my SM-J700T1 using The H.A.M.B. mobile app
When you welded your patches in ,did you happen to use weld through primer on the back side of your repaired area ? If not it is a good place for rust to start again. I always treat both sides of my repairs with it so the heat from the welding does not create a bare spot for rust to reform later. Just a long term precaution. Before I started using the weld through primer I had repaired a customers car . 2 years later he wrecked the car where I had repaired . When I got the panel off , I saw the repair had held up but rust was forming on the inside of the panel all the way around the welds. Treating the back side of repairs is just as important as painting the surface.
try fixing the holes above the windshield with a 2 part epoxy , like JB weld, etc, I've used it before on tricky areas and it works well.
I've given some thought to the 2 part epoxy, the area where the small rust holes are at appears to have rusted from inside out. I've picked at it a bit and still have no idea how large of a patch I would need to put there. There are 3-4 smaller then 1/4" in diameter spread across a 40" span. From the outside the entire area looks the same. This is a 39-47 Dodge cab, and there is a compartment above the windshield where the windshield hinges and the windshield wipers were housed. I cleaned out a pretty big mouse nest from that area. When I cleaned out the very old nest, I scrapped the entire area pretty hard, expecting to find rust holes and there were none. I scrubbed hard, and blew all the debris away, the area should be pretty clean. The sad part is, the hinges and windshield frame were toast so I am probably going to bond the windshield in. The area where 2 of the holes are will be covered with the windshield bonding stuff. I welded closed the holes in the roof where the hinges used to be and never encountered any rust through in that area, the holes I now have showed up after I used that abrasive wheel on the body. Since I have limited access to the area with the small rust holes, I believe I can coat the area with the rust converter pretty well, hopefully that would stop any farther rust holes from developing. The epoxy might be a good fix for this area. I don't like weld through primmer, its not done much for me. I've redone areas I have fixed more then 5 years after the first repair, the weld area is generally not the issue. The rotted away original metal beyond the weld area was. Gene
Good point there, too many guys fix the obvious but don't take care of the not so obvious things that come back to bite you in the butt later.
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