Looks similar on the other side but not through all the way yet. I went ahead and used a small hammer to beat out the area in the pic. I sprayed rustoleum on it and covered the holes with alum tape for now.

Is this common? I supose I'll just have to have a patch welded in? Suggestions?

 

Very common. Cut an 1/8" steel plate to fit inside of the lip of the braket and weld it in. Remove and treat the rust before welding in the plate. If the wheel wells are in good shape inside, you can cover the hole, then lay in kevlar reinforced putty for the filler. Any rust you see, and don't treat, will come back.

 

Here's what I did, relatively quick and easy compared to welding. It uses a piece of sheet metal to provide support and then a lot of fiberglass resin to seal up the area real well.

http://www.cardomain.com/ride/479957/8
http://www.cardomain.com/ride/479957/9

This is an easy solution, especially if you don't like to weld or don't have access to a welder, but you won't get the structural support of the steel plate, so I would do the welding if there are any signs of flexing or structural stress (in my case there weren't and I didn't have any evidence of structural problems before or after the repair).

Ray

 

Thansk all, I've got a 140amp hobart mig welder. Of course I've never used it yet but I'm going to try! Figure I'll practice on alot of scrap before going in there though.

 

hey looks like mine...only I havn't fixed them yet but I don't drive it yet anyway so it doesn't matter...I always love to see who has the worst bin rust outs...don't worry yours isn't the worst

 

I have some just starting. I need to clean it up. any tips?

 

Hurry....

 

And if it's not too bad, just brushing/grinding out the rust and sealing it up real well with fiberglass resins and bondo (or just some good primer and paint if there aren't any holes) should arrest the problem. The idea is to keep the water out so you want to clean it up real good then be sure you have a good water tight bond with the epoxy/bondo/paint, whatever. I've done the clean and paint treatment with my two 84 GSLs, neither of which was as bad as the 85 shown in the pictures below:

http://www.cardomain.com/ride/479957/8
http://www.cardomain.com/ride/479957/9

 

Well as I started cleaning I noticed more rust... Now I have a basketball sized hole....

I used some 16 gauge steel plate. It's really hard to work with, needed a torch to cut out a basic shape and then I had to beat it into shape. I'd reccomend some thinner material for anyone else doing this!

Got half way through patching it up and the welder ran out out of wire. I'll continue tommorow. Doesn't look half bad for my first time mig welding anything. And I only caught my jeans on fire twice!



The shiney crap is just some tin foil. I didn't want to catch anything on fire inside tha car.

 

Looking good! If my glue and screw gives out I know what to do next.

Hey I see you live in Wichita. Do you know this car, apparently it lived in your town at one time (check out the vendor's decal on the back):

http://memimage.cardomain.net/member...57_90_full.jpg

Ray

 

Nope, I don't know af any mazda performance comapnies around here. Only dealers? Maybe thats a dealer decal?

 

Yep that's a dealer decal, which means that Kansas was not totally out of it in 1984, they were actually selling GSLs. The car is totally stock (except for what I did), so performance people don't count, especially the ones that live in Kansas, even if they do exist. Do you guys get a lot of salt and rust out there? It would be great to meet this car's former owner, so if you guys aren't too busy dodging tornados, send me your VIN.

Ray

 

Actualy theres twice as many gear heads here on the bible belt. Unfortunatly not many import guys though. I just moved from FLA. What a freek'n change!

Anyway heres my Vin, let me know if you find anything interesting.

JM1FB3313F0869050

 

well here is my rust:
Passenger side

and driver side

 

if Im correct the water that gets in and ruins are wells is from the moon roof channels right?

 

dude wtf? hobart? omg dude that **** sucks a big one, get a miller it will actually work!! and make sure to get one with a 10/10 duty cycle and you will have better luck and p.s. adust your amps and volts!!!! and make sure your bloody gas is on and that your nozzle and tip is clean.

 

ahh yes.. rusted wheel wells.

In my opinion you have to cut the panels that you see from the outside behind the wheel. Why? rust is building behind it, where the area is hard the treat. I took and cut the panels out. The top plate has no structual support, i think. The other one has some. I took and cut some sheet metal to fit. Then used method sheet metal screws and a mig welder. I don't know how to weld. I think I did a "ok" job. AFtertHaT I took and sandwitched several layers with bondo with fiber glass and some sheet matel screws. To support that braket thats near that bar that is attacted to the rear, I still don't know whats it called. Later I plan to add more reinforcement when I start noticeing some flex.

You may want to check behind the.. the.. the freaking black thing that looks like tar. look for "rivers" or "trails" .. there areas where the water was able to enter and seperate the tar from the car. Signs of future rust.

I hope ya under stand my broken english;also, if for any reason you don't agree with what I have said, I welcome anyones advise,, thanks

 

I will attempt to translate this for you in a more benign friendly fasion as our friend here no speaky the english so well

basically he is saying that you need to get better penetration on your welds. if they are a surface only weld then they will pull loose very easy. check the back side of the weld where it is visible and see if the backside looks like it puddled through if so then you are getting penetration like you need.

If not you need to grind the buildup off (it has no strength as its a surface pooling only) and then adjust your amperage (needs to go higher) so that you get the required penetration.

If you cannot get the welder to get full penetration you will need to weld it from the other side also to get full strength.

kenn

 

this car is for sale on ebay! yea its a factory dealer sticker

 

I hope not, it's my daily driver!

The VIN is JMiFB331XE0813010, so it's not your old car vxturboxv, still curious if anyone recognizes this VIN for my white 84 GSL, purchased in Wichita from Wichita Mazda Ltd.

Arockrx7, that's about how the rust on my brown 85 GSL looked when I started. You need to get physical with a screw driver, some light tapping with a hammer and a good wire brush to knock out all the unsound metal, then see if you've got any structural damage. Looks like a candidate for glue, screw and bondo to me!

Ray

 

oh crap my bad! just got some dejavu. i guess i was lookin at ebay while lookin at this post and thought i saw this car on ebay. hah i just spent 10 minutes lookin at ebay over and over to find it but couldnt. thats a nice lookin gsl