Extensive results of rust treatment trials are in!

[Des]

Two years ago I tidied up a couple of bumpers, one a 25 year old Landrover rear, very rusty but not holed, and a biscuit tinlike pattern VW rear, little bit of light rust and mangled by touch parking cunts, both had a dousing in Vactan, a coat of Zinga, a 90% or so zinc content heavy coating and finished with a rollering of Lidl black metal paint. Left them to dry in a safe corner of the yard then suffered a chaotic life event and forgot about them until today.

 

Here they are, not quite reclaimed by nature yet.

 

 

Looking pretty good.

 

 

Still visible pitting which the Landrover bumper suffered, the craters have remained rust free.

 

 

Here's some paint worn away by a 12' bamboo plant, wherever the hell that came from.

 

 

This is the Rover backside, all scaly unprepared rust that got Vactanned and a random stripe of Zinga as I wiped the excess off the brush before cleaning, held up well.

 

 

Vactan and Zinga are pretty good treatments, but I'm impressed at how well they work together, although not exactly conducive to a shiny finish, they certainly help paint perform its primary role.

Then I found a scaffold pole type thing I'd bananered to reinforce that crappy VW bumper, must finish it now, give those miserable touch parkers what for.

 

[egg]

Did you do any prep before applying the vactan?

[Split_Pin]

Good to know it works, my 75 has a fair bit of Vactan underneath.

[406V6]

+1 for Vactan. Used it on the pole supporting the porch roof on the house and it's held up perfectly for three years so far.

[Des]

I did prep Mr. Egg, razzed across the rust with a poly disc until it was clean, and I suppose I could have gone further but there's always going to be a bit of rust hiding in the 'grain' of the steel, waiting to get back out, and that's where the Vactan earns a biscuit. Inside the Rover bumper was very scaly and just got slathered, did intend to Waxoyl there, hasn't done too badly and is still purple from the coating, although where the bumpers rested the undersides were sheltered.

Now to crowd fund an 8' X 16' drive through Vactan sheep dip.

[BorniteIdentity]

This might be the way forward with the towbar arrangement on my Granvia.  I did it with Hammerite about 4 years ago and it now looks worse than ever.  I imagine, like so many products, it used to be great but isn't anymore "BECOZ EUROPE" and because the company has been sold 4 times in as many hours or whatever.

 

Thanks for the tip off!

[mercrocker]

I'm a big fan of Vactan.   Basically because I am a lazy/easily distracted bastard and I can never guarantee any job gets finished properly.   There are areas on my T25 that I need to go back over having prepped and Vactan-coated them a couple of years ago.   Even perforated steel, such as a pitted door step seam shows no sign of deterioration after this period, without any primer or topcoat over the Vactan.    

 

As a controlled*, scientific* test, I Vactan-coated a wire-brushed horseshoe, oversprayed it with Poundland silver-grey paint and affixed it to my newly-built shed about 4 years ago.  Its still rust-free.... 

 

As Mr Identity has already confirmed, Hammerite is cockney rhyming-slang these days.   

[Stanky]

Interesting and very timely post - I need to give the sill rust spot on the Celica a seeing to with something to stop the surface rust getting deeper. Am I right that you get the vactan in a smoll bottle, wire wheel off the area to remove as much rust as possible, paint vactan on with a brush to the affected area, wait for it to dry then overpaint with Zinga in the same way?

 

Can you overpaint Zinga with primer/colour/lacquer afterwards?

[mercrocker]

Pretty much, Stanky....Instructions with Vactan indicate leaving some rust for it to "work" with but I tend to get off what I can.   You do not need very much Vactan!   Pour some out into a yoghurt pot or something but only a little bit!

 

Don't reuse it and I tend to keep brushes solely for Vactan. 

 

You will see it change colour as it works - sometimes a second go is needed.   It dries quickly-ish but I leave it 24 hours before overcoating, usually with Zinc primer then follow the primer recommendations.   Vactan washes out of brushes with water until it dries then its a different matter!  

[Stanky]

Thanks Mercrocker, I'll order some this weekend - the bleb is only a couple of inches across and seems to be superficial so I'll get a little bottle and see how I get on. Thanks all!

[Des]

I don't think Vactan has a great shelf life, maybe worse so once opened, a little goes a long way so not worth buying a large amount unless you live on an oil rig housing an impressive collection of corrugated iron with a robot army who enjoy licking galvanize from anything, or you have a Ford. Many years ago I popped a few unsightly rust blebs on a car my mother had just bought, dabbed them intending to return with a rattle can but never did. A decade later it had got no worse. If I ever feel the need for a purple car I'll bare metal and Vactan. Do be aware, it encourages bamboo growth, could be GR8 for a certain small model of Fiat.

[MikeR]

but for a Fiat , you would need to dip the car !