Hi there, I'm taking care of some rust on the undercarriage of my Xterra, mostly spotty surface rust, and am wondering what peoples thoughts are on using converter to treat the rust or just putting on the encapsulator. One trouble with the converter is that it's a spray and I'm concerned with getting it on not rusted surfaces, where the encapsulator can be used on both.
Thanks as always for the advice!
If it's just surface rust, I would leave it exposed at this point. Any rust you didn't cover with converter or enclapsulator and rust will be concentrated at those spots, greatly accelerating the rusting process.
I would go with Fluid Film. It's a lanolin based formula (made from sheep's wool). I've had good results with it. I apply it to my Ranger every 6 months or so. The rust hasn't progressed any farther.
I only used rust converter on things like the my Ranger's torsion bars. I sanded down the covers for the torsion bars 5 years ago, because they're easily accessible, then put rust converter on them. I haven't noticed rust recurrence, since.
@justin-shepherd Thanks for the advice, I didn't think about accelerated rust in areas that are hard to reach or that I miss
Depending on the location, it can speed up rust. If water pools in the area and you can't get to that spot to paint, the rust will concentrate in one spot and eat through the metal faster.
I have a radiator frome from a Ford Model T, I submerged it in 50% HCl while I was maintaining other tanks at a plating company I used to work for. I got all of the rust off, and started using bondo that evening. I seemingly got it all covered, but there's are still tiny bits of rust starting to develop again.