Hello Everyone,

I have a 1997 DI I bought three years ago. Two years ago, I parked it to redo the rear brakes and exhaust. Unforunately it sat for two years partially done and me being low on money did not help. I finally got around to completing that and the front brakes as well.

I yanked out the carpets a few days ago. The vehicle had sat covered with over a foot of snow on it for a couple of weeks. As it melted the front passenger carpet got soaked. I have some rust at the seams, which I plan to grind out and will use the old timers oil soak to help clean out.

I also have the typical quarter size hole in the arch of the rear doors.
Mine also had a lot of rusty bolts, calipers, and various other items I have been replacing as I work on it.

I yanked the factory bars off the front due to excessive rot thru, same with the factory side boards, those mounts rotted right off. The back bumper looks like hell, with the top flaking off. I am more into function than looks, but I want to get rid of all the original rusted stuff.

All reccomendations appreciated. I know I used about a dozen cans of PB Blaster on a variety of things I have done so far. Some of the boltheads deformed so bad, they reminded me of a shipwreck.

 

I figured someone might point that out.

 

Can the rust come back if you treat the truck bed with truck bed liner?


Can rust come back if you cover the truck bed with bed liner?


Can it come back even if you spray the bed with bed liner?


If you spray the truck bed with bed liner, can the rust come back?

 

Yes. The general rule with hard coatings is that they only mask existing rust, not stop it and will dry out and crack letting water in under the coating to cause future problems. This applies to rubberized undercoating etc. From what I have gleaned from the google is the wax type coatings are the only real way to stop or slow down rust. They stay oleophobic and solvent thus repelling any moisture and not allowing anything to get into cracks etc. They don't dry out. They do require maintenance (yearly or seasonal reapplication) and can appear to be very messy at first application. Then you realize it's not that bad. At least that's my experience. I did this last summer and coming out of winter anywhere I applied the wax stuff is fine and still holding up well. Places I missed or suspension parts exposed have a bit of surface rust. I live in KC MO so middle west, we get humidity and salt, the corrosion tag team.
I used Woolwax off Amazon. There are other like fluid film. It's made with sheep wool and smells a little weird at first but goes away. Pets like to lick it off the driveway. Clean up is water mostly.