how bad is the rust here?

[gt28r]

hello. i attached a picture of the battery tray. how bad is the rust here? thank you.

[beandip]

Well it dosen't look good . It's difficult to tell from the picture . Hose it off and wire brush and scrape the loose rust away . See if there is any rust through spots , especially below the tray where the inner fender attaches to the frame rail . This is the critical area . The battery tray looks mostly gone in the picture. Use some baking soda and water to treat the battery acid in the area . If there is no rust through then you have dodged the bullet . The frame rail is the biggest worry here . Gary

[gt28r]

thank you for the reply. worst case what will be needed to repair the rust? is the car worth purchasing and at what price?

[zman525]

gunna need some more info on the car.. What year? hows the condition everywhere else, what are ur skills in welding? are u willing to devote time and money into it?. Pics of the rest of the car and areas that are prone to rusting ( frame rails, doglegs, rear quarters, rockers, inner rockers, floor pans, floor support rail and so on) would help out. Post some pics of it and we'll be able to tell you more

[hls30.com]

We need to see more to answer that properly.

The more pictures, the better your answer will be.

Will

[agemeansnothing]

Yeah need more info. But get a screwdriver and tap the surrounding surfaces for hidden rust holes.

[LanceM]

Looks pretty bad, hole in firewall above tray, if there is a hole there then the seam between the firewall and inner fender is gone too. Looks like a lot more than just scraping off the rust and repainting. This is just one part of the car, but if it looks like this the rest of the car is probably needing Big $ to bring it up snuff...

[cremmenga]

On my parts car, I wa originally going to restore it but tore it apart to bare everything and these are the parts that I found rust on you might check on this one! I got robbed on it to he said it wasn't as bad as it was but there was about an inch of bondo hiding everything! DAMN THEM!

1.By rear bumper bolts.

2. Under rear hatch, on that thin metal and under it too, where you can't see.

3. Rear fenders, along with innner fenders

4.doors underneath the hinges

5.Inner and outer rocker panels. tear up carpet and look

6. Floors, tunnel, esp. passenger side under heater.

7. Firewall by battery tray

8. Floor supports, front frame rails etc.

9. Door seams

10. Front fenders, and underneath them where you can't see on the inner body.

Those are all I can think of that were bad on my crapy car so I hope it gives you an idea of where to look, and if your car was like this check for bondo and look in the rear hatch at the sides of the fenders from the inside and see if they have been replaced before and if you can tell if there is alot of bondo. Like I said I got bent over and didn't know it and I paid $400 for mine.

Just a tip buy one that is good so you don't have to do what I did:

floors-$200

headlight case-$60

front fenders-380

door skins-140 which i'm selling buy the way!!!

rockers-120

rear wheel housing-300

rear arch-160

front frame rails-340

[gt28r]

thank you all for the help. i have not seen the car in person. the car is a couple hours away and i wanted an opinion before seeing the car. the rust may be a problem and body parts are not 1970 original. the car is listed on ebay. the reasons the car is attractive to me is that it is a low vin series one and within driving distance. i may look for another car.

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=4586180022

[tfbomke]

Here's a hint on checking for bondo. Take a small magnetized screwdriver with you. Stick the magnet on the car body/frame at suspected areas, if there is bondo under there the magnet will barely stick or wont stick at all if w/ a thick patch of bondo. Like Beandip said above, really look at the frame rails, you can tell if the car has been in a major front end collision and if rust has eaten through those rails you may want to look for another Z. Happy hunting.

[DatsunZsRule]

That one picture is enough for me to decide.

That Batt Tray is practically gone, and the firewall above whats left of the battery tray has a good size hole. I can only imagine what all the other hidden spots must look like on that poor Z.

[cremmenga]

from the pic that car looks like it has less rust than the one of mine that is getting a complete resto as we speak.