What to do to body undercover to high salt usage areas

yes, and it's a lot of work. especially to reinstall properly.

 

When rustproofing the rear suspension (on our gen 3), specifically the trailing arms, there's small plastic panels at the forward ends of the arms, secured in part by small bolts. Even on our wet coast environment, by 7~8 years they were near-seized, was afraid of snapping off the heads. Sooner than later is good with these, and douse them with oil.

 

I don't live with salty winter roads, but if I did I'd probably build a sprayer and blower I could drive over before parking in garage. Seems the rust is only going to get started if the salt sits on the undercarriage for a long period of time and washing off the bottom of your car often would solve that.

I'd also probably consider a second layer of belly pan made of corrugated plastic to further limit where salty water can reach.

Anyone know anyone who's tried any of these?

 

Never under-estimate the laziness of workers; no matter how much you pay them for undercoating/rust-proofing.

There are under-body washes at most car washes back east. Doesn't do much if you under-carnage is covered in plastic. Rust proofing needs to be done with the under belly plastic OFF. I would probably peel-off the plastic under belly every other season for a good power wash and shake out any road debris accumulated up there; just so I could inspect it.

YMMV

I've seen plenty of cars from the NE states and I wouldn't call them road worthy. But as long as you can pass smog every two years - your good. I knew this gal that drove her Oldsmobile Cutlass out here and you could reach into it through the lower door panel. She said it was great, since the AC stopped working last week and nobody would steal it. She lived in a not so great neighborhood; so there's that....

 

Yeah... We have same weak sauce underbody wash squirters at car wash out here on West Coast too. But my thought is you could use garden irrigation parts to build something much more robust. Also that way you wouldn't get salty water on underside of car when driving home from the car wash.