Yeah, I could – but I wouldn’t.
I am impressed with the flex pipe. All that movement and it hasn’t broke.
Leigh
Whitehall, NY
I’m surprised the whole subframe hadn’t come clear out from under the sumbitch.
Vehicle mass and the effect on mileage did that. Add in FEA for minimizing the amount of material to carry a load and how geometry and shape dynamics influences design and you get no material to withstand the ravages of corrosion. Typically the car of the 60’s would take 40 years to get to that point but the new stuff can be gone in 10. If I still lived in a salt on the road environment I’d hose the vehicle (top and bottom) after every snow fall.
Spin
Check out Eric O’s South Main Auto Repair on YouTube. His shop is in upstate New York and they must get their road salt from Connecticut.
Cars eight years old are ate slap up underneath.
I had a 1990 Ford Taurus where the big washers on the bolts holding the front subframe to the main body assembly rusted out and failed as I was taking off from a traffic light. The assembly dropped onto the steering. I was barely able to get out of the street. Thankfully all I had to do was replace the washers and bolts once I had it towed home.
I had almost the same issue with my ’95 Taurus. Except the front left mount rotted through. You couldn’t see it from the side, but when you took a left turn, the body would articulate around the k-frame. Made the off-ramp a hairy experience when it broke. Thought it was going to roll. I ended up welding a 4x6x1/4 plate between the K-frame and the unibody rail.
Stayed that way until I retired it @ 389k miles, with terminal cancer. Still ran and drove great.
Leigh
Whitehall, NY
Well, except for the bolt DROPPING out one day, my ’89 SHO is in great shape. Didn’t know about it until I took it over to my friend’s garage and we put it up on the hoist!!
Thank goodness I didn’t find out about it the hard way!
That’s one reason I won’t buy a used car without first seeing the underside. I noticed that there was very little rust on the visible parts of the car. The rusted out portions were the driver and passenger footwells. You cannot let the carpeting get saturated with road salt and water if you want the car to last. I have WeatherTech floor liners in all my vehicles to keep the salt from my boots from rusting the floor pan from the inside.
Looks like a Connecticut car, they are still using road salt treated with liquid magnesium chloride. The only real way to wash it off is by neutralizing it with a mild acid such as oxalic acid. This stuff is horrible on cars, trucks and you should see what it does to the rebar in bridges, it dissolves the steel into a mass of red rust. The DOT does not care they are too busy trying to electrify their fleet.
Bought a ’63 Tempest once and after I got plates for it I filled it up with gas and went home. The next morning on the way to work I hit a bump and heard a loud scraping noise. When I stopped and looked around the back, I discovered that the weight of my full tank had torn the whole bottom out of the trunk and the tank was still strapped to it. The only thing holding it in was the lines and the filler neck. So I cut about 40 feet of barbed wire out of a fence along the side of the road and used that to reattach the whole thing. Drove it for another year like that.
A man after my own heart.
Eventually sold it to a kid that worked for me for $25 more than I had paid for it. My next ride was a ’72 Luxury Le Mans, a big upgrade and the first of about a dozen GM ’71-’75 A bodies, I still love those cars.
I’m starting to wonder whether something is coming loose on my decrepit Focus. Rear hatch isn’t lined up – very slight discrepancy, but used to be better. Some odd tire wear on one side – haven’t had any differences in tire wear among the corners, until now.
They vote and drive cars like that on the road with you and me.
My dad is a TV repairman, he has an awesome set of tools….we can fix it…..
Nice movie reference Jim
Neighbor had a car like that a dozen years ago. Told him best thing we could do is call a wrecker instead of limping it home. Gave me a sob story about how he couldn’t afford it, and begged and pleaded me to just weld it back together. It was just a farm pickup. Not happy about it, but 400# of channel and square tube later, he drove it home. Had it on the lift about a month ago, still going strong. The rest of the frame is rotted all to hell, but the frame I added is as good as it was when I put it on.
Like someone above said, we could still have robust frames if it wasn’t for those government morons in charge of fuel economy.
Are these cars from the east coast? Because of all the damage there is.
From using salt on the roads during the winter. Is that what is going on with these vehicles?
Yeah, I could – but I wouldn’t.
I am impressed with the flex pipe. All that movement and it hasn’t broke.
Leigh
Whitehall, NY
I’m surprised the whole subframe hadn’t come clear out from under the sumbitch.
Vehicle mass and the effect on mileage did that. Add in FEA for minimizing the amount of material to carry a load and how geometry and shape dynamics influences design and you get no material to withstand the ravages of corrosion. Typically the car of the 60’s would take 40 years to get to that point but the new stuff can be gone in 10. If I still lived in a salt on the road environment I’d hose the vehicle (top and bottom) after every snow fall.
Spin
Check out Eric O’s South Main Auto Repair on YouTube. His shop is in upstate New York and they must get their road salt from Connecticut.
Cars eight years old are ate slap up underneath.
I had a 1990 Ford Taurus where the big washers on the bolts holding the front subframe to the main body assembly rusted out and failed as I was taking off from a traffic light. The assembly dropped onto the steering. I was barely able to get out of the street. Thankfully all I had to do was replace the washers and bolts once I had it towed home.
I had almost the same issue with my ’95 Taurus. Except the front left mount rotted through. You couldn’t see it from the side, but when you took a left turn, the body would articulate around the k-frame. Made the off-ramp a hairy experience when it broke. Thought it was going to roll. I ended up welding a 4x6x1/4 plate between the K-frame and the unibody rail.
Stayed that way until I retired it @ 389k miles, with terminal cancer. Still ran and drove great.
Leigh
Whitehall, NY
Well, except for the bolt DROPPING out one day, my ’89 SHO is in great shape. Didn’t know about it until I took it over to my friend’s garage and we put it up on the hoist!!
Thank goodness I didn’t find out about it the hard way!
That’s one reason I won’t buy a used car without first seeing the underside. I noticed that there was very little rust on the visible parts of the car. The rusted out portions were the driver and passenger footwells. You cannot let the carpeting get saturated with road salt and water if you want the car to last. I have WeatherTech floor liners in all my vehicles to keep the salt from my boots from rusting the floor pan from the inside.
There’s lot more like that here
https://www.youtube.com/@JustRolledIn
My favorite site!
JB Weld for the win!
Looks like a Connecticut car, they are still using road salt treated with liquid magnesium chloride. The only real way to wash it off is by neutralizing it with a mild acid such as oxalic acid. This stuff is horrible on cars, trucks and you should see what it does to the rebar in bridges, it dissolves the steel into a mass of red rust. The DOT does not care they are too busy trying to electrify their fleet.
Bought a ’63 Tempest once and after I got plates for it I filled it up with gas and went home. The next morning on the way to work I hit a bump and heard a loud scraping noise. When I stopped and looked around the back, I discovered that the weight of my full tank had torn the whole bottom out of the trunk and the tank was still strapped to it. The only thing holding it in was the lines and the filler neck. So I cut about 40 feet of barbed wire out of a fence along the side of the road and used that to reattach the whole thing. Drove it for another year like that.
A man after my own heart.
Eventually sold it to a kid that worked for me for $25 more than I had paid for it. My next ride was a ’72 Luxury Le Mans, a big upgrade and the first of about a dozen GM ’71-’75 A bodies, I still love those cars.
I’m starting to wonder whether something is coming loose on my decrepit Focus. Rear hatch isn’t lined up – very slight discrepancy, but used to be better. Some odd tire wear on one side – haven’t had any differences in tire wear among the corners, until now.
They vote and drive cars like that on the road with you and me.
My dad is a TV repairman, he has an awesome set of tools….we can fix it…..
Nice movie reference Jim
Neighbor had a car like that a dozen years ago. Told him best thing we could do is call a wrecker instead of limping it home. Gave me a sob story about how he couldn’t afford it, and begged and pleaded me to just weld it back together. It was just a farm pickup. Not happy about it, but 400# of channel and square tube later, he drove it home. Had it on the lift about a month ago, still going strong. The rest of the frame is rotted all to hell, but the frame I added is as good as it was when I put it on.
Like someone above said, we could still have robust frames if it wasn’t for those government morons in charge of fuel economy.
Are these cars from the east coast? Because of all the damage there is.
From using salt on the roads during the winter. Is that what is going on with these vehicles?