Mazda5 Rust!

[topFC3Sman]

Ah, rust... the brown cancer, the slow death, the bane of 2000's Mazdas' existence. And of course the microvan has it. I haven't done much with the wheel wells yet (which are getting pretty bad), but last weekend I started to take on what I could find underneath. Most of it was just surface rust, but when I pulled the passenger's side rocker panel off...

Just look at all the debris removing the rockers!

Anyhow, after a lot of wire-brushing & cutting away the worst sections, everything got coated with primer & rubbery underbody spray, the rocker panel got repaired a bit (most of the plastic clips & arms they attach to were broken off), and it all went back together. My arms are killing me after laying on my back with the wire brush and cut-off wheel all day. No pics of the finished product, since I was just tired out & forgot, but I get to do it all again on the driver's side soon...

 

[topFC3Sman]

Yay, more rust!

All over the wheel well seam! The only connection between the outer fender panel and the inner structure was about 2" of intact wheel arch. Unfortunately, everything around that 2" was rotted, so the whole thing had to get cut out

Plastic patch panel for the giant hole in the wheel well:

Holes drilled through the remaining metal & plastic panel, with doubled-up zip ties to hold the bulk of the panel in place. Plus, another coat of primer just to make sure all exposed metal back there is covered...

Ya know... I'm kinda a fan of zip-ties...

All the zip ties tightened up, with the remains of the outer fender panel bent over to hold the outer edge in place

More paint to try to seal stuff up

Bending up the outer edge & trying to seal up the rust there

And the trailing edge.

I also coated all the primer with 3 coats of bed-liner, but it was too dark at that point to get photos - that'll have to come tomorrow.

 

[FiftySix]

Damn, that sucks! What part of the country are you in that contributes to the rust problem?

 

[Secondtyme]

Holy crap! That is really, really, bad. I gotta pull my side sill extensions off and look at mine since it has the rust bubbles on the rear wheel arch. My rear fenders are nowhere near as bad as that though. I'll second the question of where are you located, and also ask how many miles you have on your 5.

 

[Hank3]

Damn, that sucks! What part of the country are you in that contributes to the rust problem?

This...

 

[topFC3Sman]

This is in Ann Arbor, MI. The car is a 2006, with 113k miles. It's been in this area since new, and they certainly don't spare the salt over the winter. We bought the car knowing that it had some rust problems and the price reflected it - this is just a little bit more extensive than I anticipated. There are a few other 3's and 5's that I've seen around town with significant rust in the same areas; I don't know how bad they are under the surface but it's definitely a problem here. My daily driver '06 Saab with almost 170k miles is nowhere near as bad, but I also try to take care of it & wash it more over the winter.

Anyway, I finished up the job yesterday... and the results are interesting...

This is the only place on the driver's side rocker panel that was really bad - the passenger's side was much worse despite having the better wheel arch.

After bending in the outer edge of the fender at the bottom to hold the plastic panel, it's significantly shorter than it used to be. I've lost the rear mount for the side skirt, so until I can build something to replace it, its zip-tie time.

The semi-finished result. The plastic sill extension isn't reinstalled here (those pictures came out poorly due to an old phone & low light), but it sticks out a good 2" past where the fender now ends. I need to look into fender flares, maybe from the CX5 or a Subaru Outback or something to cover up the gap.

 

[mazdadude]

Holy crap! That is really, really, bad. I gotta pull my side sill extensions off and look at mine since it has the rust bubbles on the rear wheel arch. My rear fenders are nowhere near as bad as that though. I'll second the question of where are you located, and also ask how many miles you have on your 5.

OH THE HORROR! (boom07)

I just can not believe pictures like this are of just a 9-10 yr old car!

You guys need to come get your used cars from out west or something... (uhm)

 

[Silentnoise713]

OMG that looks terrible! But it seems you have done this before and itll look great once finished with some fender flares. At least you dont have to worry about rolling fenders
Has the car's registrations always been in the MI snow belt? I would guess it was in a minor/low level coastal flooding (sea water). Hows the bumper beam?


Option Q/A. how much did you pay for it (put effort into perspective)?

 

[topFC3Sman]

The car's always been in MI - the people we bought it from in Ann Arbor had gotten it from their neighbor, the original owner. Nothing on the carfax or in any of the maintenance records that we got with it about flooding or similar damage, and there hasn't been any serious flooding that I know of in the area besides a freak rain storm in Warren, MI about a year ago (which I got caught in the middle of with a guy I carpooled with - he was driving that day, so I was pushing when the car stalled in the middle of a deep area).

The only other serious bodywork I've done was cutting away the rotted bottom part of my RX-7's fender, forming a new piece, welding it in place & smoothing/painting it, and some interesting zip-tie repairs on my parents' car. I'd at least need to wait until I got a garage to do any steel-work on the fender wells, and then borrow the welder again.

hand-formed patch panel getting welded

"Paint Booth" on my apartment balcony

Zip Ties!

The car itself is a manual base model 5 with 112k when we bought it. We could see the rust on the fenders and I checked the underbody for structural rust, but didn't pull off the side skirts when inspecting it. We paid $3800 after negotiating with the seller (private sale thru craigslist), so all-told, I still think it was a good purchase.

 

[FiftySix]

You are the King of Zip Ties!

I've used outdoor rated zip ties to reattach my wife's 2008 Honda Civic's bumper cover when it got ripped off backing out of the garage. Lots of drilling and lots of zip ties, all on the underside. It's been about 8 months now and still holding strong. (cabpatch)

 

[Silentnoise713]

The car's always been in MI - the people we bought it from in Ann Arbor had gotten it from their neighbor, the original owner. Nothing on the carfax or in any of the maintenance records that we got with it about flooding or similar damage, and there hasn't been any serious flooding that I know of in the area besides a freak rain storm in Warren, MI about a year ago (which I got caught in the middle of with a guy I carpooled with - he was driving that day, so I was pushing when the car stalled in the middle of a deep area).

...

The car itself is a manual base model 5 with 112k when we bought it. We could see the rust on the fenders and I checked the underbody for structural rust, but didn't pull off the side skirts when inspecting it. We paid $3800 after negotiating with the seller (private sale thru craigslist), so all-told, I still think it was a good purchase.

Good to know. Rain and lake water is just a nuisance compared to sea (salt) water. So it just seems the previous owner just didn’t take care of the car over winter. That is unusually bad.

Price looks good. Are you going to paint it yourself as well? Props for all the body and zip tie work. It takes a lot of time and a good eye to do.

 

[New5Owner]

It really isn't unusually bad. In Canada - Quebec especially - most ~10 yo Mazdas are more rust than car.

 

[topFC3Sman]

Back from the dead!

Actually, I was just reminded of this thread when a Mazda5 came up on sh*tbox Showdown on the Autopian (theautopian.com), so figured I'd drop in some photos of what this hacked repair looked like after 3 1/2 years when I sold this van.

Overall, really not bad! Some rust poking through here and there, but all still very intact. I never did get around to finding fender flares to cover up the gap... picked some up from a junkyard that looked about the right radius, but never had the time to tackle a project that was purely cosmetic and would probably be a pain since there was nothing aft of the sliding doors to mount them to.