Hello, Today I went underneath my S2000 to change the oil. Bought the car last year.

I was just checking around the car and seen some rust, but I am not sure if I should worry about this.

Its from 1999 and is sincs one year garage kept, looking to keep it that way.

Looking for you guys opinion about what to do with it.

Front Jacking point

Underneath driver

Rear

Co-driver side dif

Rear frame

Driverside diff

 

Appears car was driven in winter. Salted roads.

The rust starting on the sheet metal areas are the concern. Not an issue yet, but its only gonna get worse over time.

Get thee some por15 paint. Follow instructions to the letter. It'll halt all the rusting.

You can also apply to places like diff and other suspension pieces to pretty them up.

 

The car was definitely driven thru winter

I was in a similar situation as you. I basically took the entire car apart, acid dipped everything possible, and did a combination of POR and 2K on it.

 

You removed the whole underside? Every part till there was nothing left?

 

I removed the entire rear subframe, engine, trans, suspension. I didn't remove the fuel and brake lines.

I removed all of the bolt-on body panels.

I took most of the large sub-assy's apart on the subframe and engine so that I could clean and de-rust and treat them individually.

If I couldn't salvage stuff, I'd buy new parts from Honda or used parts from a rust free area.

I bought about 6 million LB's of new bolts, a few gallons of acid, and a lot of POR15

OR

You could just take the approach of not looking at it.

Everything in between is a half measure at best. What I did took me months and months. And even then, it could stand for more to be done.

You would have to be a complete jackass to do what I've done.

Its a bad idea to buy a car that's been winter driven if rust bothers you.

 

You da man!

 

I think you've missed the boat. POR 15 might help but that looks pretty bad. I would think that to do a proper job you would have to sandblast the surface rust off back to good metal and then POR 15 at that point. Did you not look at the underside before you bought the car?

 

The people saying it looks bad must not live in areas woth winter, and road salt. All cars look like that underneath around here.

The stuff on this car that is rusted all over, are things that ain't ever gonna rust through. Like the diff, propshaft, control arms. Addressing rust on these components is just cosmetic.

Por15 will easily cover that, and transform it. No need to blast to bare metal, its meant to go right on top of surface rust like that. Just need to wire brush the loose stuff. Wear good mask. Then follow the other steps like metal prep, etc.

The stuff that is an actual concern are the sheetmetal parts that are just starting to become rusted. Those you'll want to make sure to not just wire brush, but use blunt screwdriver or similar to knock off any rust chunks. Then the por15 steps. So long as the metal still has integrity and structure, you're ok.

If you do it now, you'll be good. Wait much longer, and it'll no longer be an easy repair. You'll be looking at welding in patches, etc. Then rust proofing that.

 

All cars driven in winter and road salt look like this, if they are indeed driven in winter. Could be that the OP never thought to look underneath, because he as many, thought that a sport convertible would not be the ideal winter car, or was told that it was garaged in winter. Buyer beware!

Good advice none the less.

 

In terms of cars driven in winter that is not bad at all. I would try to address it though. You can wire brush, etch and apply POR over a lot of it and most likely prevent it from spreading. Where it has penetrated though it likely is rusted on the back side of some panels so will not be able to do a lot there with any practical methods. For large peices of metal like suspension arms, I would not worry a ton with that amount of rust. You could still clean them up and POR (I believe POR recommends using an etchant first to remove as much as possible so just follow the directions). But, if driven in winter, the first things you are going to see are rust in the trunk floor and the quarter panels will rust through. The quarters rust from the inside out, between the two skins so you wont see it until the paint starts to blister. This is a very common rust point on these cars. Mine even had it on one quarter and my car is pretty much pristine underneath. As in, All my control arms come out with ease, zero rusted bolts, no cutting (Even the front lowers with the compliance bushings) but I still was hit with one quarter panel that rusted. So I fully expect you will see that appear at some point.