rustproofing gen 4

You have your car now? If practical, I would suggest DIY application of a wax/oil sealant. For the most part, for anything you can reach, it's best to not spray. Instead apply with a small brush and/or rags. Focus on suspension components, bolts and nuts. Painted car body I would leave alone, it's more impervious.

On the suspension I've found welds most rust prone. Also back out any small secondary fasteners, soak their threads and reinstall.

What I did was raise the rear one day, the front another. I waited about 3 years before I looked at ours; wish I'd got on it sooner.

 

That sounds like dealership add-on. It might be worthwhile, not sure.

What I do know: its labour intensive to to apply sealant carefully/surgically. Again, I would recommend DIY, use a petroleum based sealant, take your time. You will end up knowing your car a lot better too.

 

It'd be nice if they've improved it; I hope so. I'll find and link some pics I previously posted. My impression: Toyota's not doing enough. We've had Honda's previously, for over 30 years, never had anywhere near this propensity to rust.

 

Couldn't find that link, will just repost a few, this is trailing arm on 3rd gen rear suspension. The bolts in particular look shite. I found some of the bolts holding on plastic underpanels towards the rear were near-seized, almost snapped the heads off.






And here's a plastic-to-plastic bolted splice just ahead of the front wheel wells. This was completely hopeless:

Exterior, for orientation:



Interior:

 

This is still just a surface rust like on any Toyota of last few decades. And it will last another decade or two before rust goes through.
Go buy a Tesla and enjoy the same levels of rust on a 3 year old car inside the passenger area, not on the outside like pictured above.

 

Move to California or Arizona. You'll feel better, too.

 

Don't make me post my So Cal video again....

 

How does a Prius, or a Tesla, accumulate rust on the inside?

 

IN- crementaly

 

Good pictures Mendel. Thanks. That rust looks pretty bad, mate. I crawled under my Camry several times in the past 10 years, and I never saw rust like that. Maybe it just happens in the wetter/snowy climates? Or does it just happen to Pre-Eyes? That ain't good. (And you said your Hondas never rusted.) That doesn't speak very well for Toyota.

 

We get road salt in the winter, but it's not that cold, not that much snow, very infrequent. So salt and water I guess. I've heard many of the coatings they were formally allowed to use on nuts/bolts are being curtailed, due to being carcinogen.

To me it feels like one man's ceiling, another man's floor though: I'm doing occasional forays under a couple of Hondas as well as our Prius, the bolts on the Honda's seem near pristine. Same thing for suspension steel. Toyota uses a lot of coarse thread screws on their plastic trim as well; they're particularly rust-prone.

In the bottom picture in my post #7, those bolts are completely rust-bound, I found out the hard way, snapped the head off one, thought this can't be, so snapped the head off another on the opposite side of the car, before I quit, lol. You pretty much have to treat them as permanent, rust-bound pop rivets.

 

In years past (pre-Prius) I always had my car undercoated. Not only did it protect the metal, but the added mass insulated so much road noise.

OTOH, I owned a Highlander (don't recall the year, but an early one). When I traded, the exterior and interior looked like new. But the underside suspension and structural components were completely rusted. I was counseled to get rid of it ASAP. Oh, it was not undercoated like I mentioned above.

 

When I bought my Prius, nobody said anything (or tried to sell me) rust-proofing/undercoating. Did the dealers discontinue that?

 

I don't think wholesale spraying of the underside would be effective, in the right places, or practical. It's a real olio of materials and bolts, from the front to the back. The painted sheet metal of the body is the most pristine, it's suspension components and bolts that suffer, and I don't think they should/would undercoat those. I think what I did, a surgical, piece by piece cleaning and coating with wax/oil is good, but it's very labour intensive, I don't think you could make a business model to do this, too time consuming and fiddly.

 

I'm sure you did a good job. Well worth the time & effort.

 

rust never sleeps...

 

And never stops eating either! Next hot dog is on me CC