Winter driving ,Rot protection
Garrick Clark:
:D. Not a bad idea. What wax should I use ;D
Nico86:
Living in a place with snow and salt on the roads from November to March, my advice would be : don't drive your car during these months if you want to keep it in the long time!
I keep my bugs away from the road in winter months, I just drive them around town every 2 weeks or something to keep them running. When I do I clean the pan and underskirts with a Karcher to get rid of salt and dirt.
For this reason several years ago I bought a 1977 Golf to drive in winter, cheap but very clean, and I drove the thing in the snow/salt/rain not caring about it and knowing that would destroy it : the result is next month it won't pass the MOT because of rust, and honestly even if it was passing it I would not drive the thing anymore ;D It's completely rotten by rust and falling apart, and most of it was cause by salt and wet weather during winter months, there's not a sheet of metal on the car that didn't suffer and the car is good to be sent to the junkyard. I did everything to it : wax, retouching the paint every year on the pan and underskirt with epoxy paint or rust-stop (frameto, hammerite...) paint to chase rust away. It only slowed down the process a bit.
Comparing it with some of my friends living on the mediterranean coast, they drive their car all year round and none of them suffered rust like my Golf did. There's a considerable difference I noticed. I asked bodyshops, restorers, painters, and there's no miralce solution. Waxing the underskirts of the car might slow the problem, but you will never be able to protect everything. Having seen many old cars from my area I can say it's not a legend that winter will ruin a car. Especially cars from the 60/70s that were not protected from factory.
Maybe the place where you live isn't as bad in winter than where I am living, here there are period of 1 or 2 weeks where the temperature stays below zero even in the middle of the day, and they put salt on the roads several times during the week, and that's when the wet area on your car won't dry and destroy your car.
Now if you don't plan on keeping the car for long, then why not driving it and you'll "pass the problem" to the next owner. Bugs aren't rare but it doesn't mean you have to ruin yours ;) (and a never welded 67 with og panels is rare in my opinion)
You mentionned how salt and wet damages the tarmac on your local roads, imagine it doing the same to your car.
Nico86:
That's my Golf in winter a few years ago, and how our cars look like here after a few days, most of it is salt/grim from the road :
Here is the Opel of a friend of mine, he bought it og and clean and after a few years driving in winter here it is :
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DaveN:
Don’t bother! Salt will rot your car or someone will drive into it, the amount of people I see daily using phones is unbelievable, chances of one of these idiots spotting your old bug indicating will be slim. Far too many distractions in a modern car for most people to concentrate.
Garrick Clark:
I'll leave it we're it is then. I'd be F ING furious if it rotted. Suppose I've done the engine mods at the wrong time of year. Gone bigger turbo with carb mods, engine is running again but can't test to see if the hard work has produced any torque gains. I'll have to think up another mod to do. Possibly ignition.
Cheers guys.
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