Hey Scotty, I’ve been watching your videos for a long time. I recently traded my Grand Cherokee for a pre-owned 2022 Lexus GX460 with only 8,000 miles on it. I live in Pennsylvania and we get snow. I want to keep the vehicle for years — maybe even decades. Should I look into some sort of rustproofing, and if so, which type do you recommend? Thanks for all the car advice!
-Jason
Lexus is made by Toyota. They have that kind of thing down to a science. Scotty's mom lives in Buffalo, New York, or very near it, and she had a 2005 or so Toyota Corolla. It never suffered a rust issue in the time she had it. Just surface rust in areas of exposed steel.
@justin-shepherd It does seem like the unibody cars seem to do okay, however, I have seen many Toyota and Lexus SUVs and trucks rot to pieces from rust, in the years from 2000-2010 at least.
Although my 2005 Matrix structure was doing okay, I still hit it with cosmoline to stave off the rust from anywhere I can. The rocker panels and some other areas are still prone to rusting. I also hit the control arms, especially the rear that are rather expensive on the awd version. They had a fair bit of rust starting up.
As long as you take decent care of it, it should last a really long time. Those Toyotas you've seen are probably rusting out because the driver didn't keep up with car washes. Salt corrodes metals. They're definitely not cars from the 1970s, providing you wash it consistently, especially in the winter time, it's no big deal. Ford and such will still rust, becausethey don'tpay attention to detail. You may cause the car to start rusting prematurely because you put an anti-rust coating on it, and, once the impermeable surface gets chipped, you open it to rust.
Watch out for mechanics jacking up the car and damaging the paint on the jack points. It's worth spraying clear laquer on it if they do, or if they bend the jacking points so you can keep an eye on it.
