Bathing the Ugly Bits

The appearance of Ferd' is deceiving. Don't look too closely and he's a handsome chap. But more than a dozen years sitting on dirt have really taken their toll, and the four years being driven by a punk kid from 1995-1998 didn't help either. So when I jacked Ferd' up to pull the fuel pump and FPR, I was grossed out enough that I didn't want to be working under there without giving the keel a bath. The engine looked like a corndog with dirt caked on oil, and the transmission had enough road tar, goop and God-knows-what on it (which had set up to a rigid, tar-like consistency) that I decided that it was time to pull out the best weapons I know for fighting this kind of neglect: Solvent, and a 2000 psi pressure washer driving 130*F water.

You would amazed at how well this combo works. When I pulled the Left Rear Wheel, what I found was crazy with surface rust, but no penetrating rust. Even the rear drums, which were new when the vehicle was parked in 1998 looked awful. Shocks? Rusted. Swing arm? Rusted. Everything: Rusted.

But just the surface. I spend a good hour whanging a small hammer around underneath...listening. Never once did it go 'crunch!' when I tapped metal. Much of the factory undercoating is still in place, which is a blessing. So I have good reason to have high confidence in the structural soundness of the frame.

That doesn't mean that I'm going to drive it in this condition; since the whole brake system has to be checked out, most likely all of these parts are either going to be replaced or are going to get a coating of Eastwood Rust Encapsulator (which is just the UK Corroless, rebranded.) But items like that rear wheel drum (knowing when the drum went on and how few miles were put on it) may be completely salvageable with light machining on the inside.

But back to engine and transmission. Looking like they had been sprayed with tar and then feathered with powdered charcoal, they were in bad shape, and made it difficult to avoid coming out from under the car without looking like Al Jolsen in 'The Jazz Singer.'

After much cleaning, the individual fins on the bottom of the case
were visible again. The ribs on the transmission took more work
but eventually washed clean as well. (Reference photo)

I purchased a single can of engine degreaser, the evil stuff that they tell you will cause Cancer in California. (Apparently nowhere else.) I coated the bottom and rear of the engine, as well as the whole transmission. Then I strolled off for a bit to let it cook. I'm convinced that this is three-quarters of the secret of using any of these products: don't be in such a damn hurry to hose them off. Let'em cook, especially if they're a solvent.

I wandered back out and lit up the pressure washer with a long tap from our deep sink, which is, by way of copper pipe, only a meter from the hot water heater. I dialed the nozzle to zero interference, lay down on my creeper, and started blasting. This water was near 130*F and between the solvent, the heat and the pressure, the goop on the engine and transmission came off, though the transmission required a recoating of solvent.

After that, I switched over to an industrial cleaner that fed into the pressure washer stream by venturi and cleaned sections of the body, especially those behind the rear wheels. I think old Ferd' is going to be 5 pounds lighter in the rear end, now that all of that dirt is out. And another surprise was waiting for me: what I had assumed was rust in the rear wheel wells was really orange dirt! Under it, I found that the original undercoating was mostly intact, with just a spritz of red from the slovenly job that MAACO had done when they had pimped up Ferd' with his coat of red paint over the CE1 Agate Brown / Atlas White factory combination.

This cleaning job is more than just fastidiousness on my part. It is an essential part of inspection, and knowing the condition of the vehicle. While it would be lovely to be able to do this kind of deep inspection prior to purchase, unless you're buying from a close friend, it is unlikely that a buyer is going to let you work over a vehicle in this much detail.