Opel GT Forum banner

Rust

15K views 68 replies 18 participants last post by  opelmeister 
#1 ·
So tired of surprises.
424802
424803
 
See less See more
2
#8 ·
Rust is horrible and it's always worse than what you can see. Unless you really feel like trying to repair that GT and sink a lot of time and money into it, it's now a donor car. It can be fixed and part of me would rather see every GT saved. Realistically, finding a GT without any rust will cost less in the long run.
 
#10 ·
You have to have something to weld to and stop more rust before you get to the next repair.
That GT has a lot of inner panels that are rusted away under the outer rusted panels.
Nothing to prove here just a matter of money, time and enjoyment of driving your car.
 
#11 ·
Yup, that car is toast. Don't feel bad, many of us have had a car that bad as our "starter GT". It's a lesson in GT's learned. Now you know what to look for in a good, or good enough, GT body. GT's almost always look pretty good above the rocker panels. At the rockers and below is where things go to heck in a handbasket. One lesson to learn: Never buy a GT from east of the Mississippi, they all have "morning dew" rust at the bottom of the car. Get a body from west of the Missy. Western cars tend to have good bodies and all the rubber and plastic tuned to dust, Eastern cars tend to have good rubber and plastic and rust out the ying-yang. My GTX car came from out West, good body/no interior at all, just a shell. My previous Red Baron car was from the East, it had great rubber/plastic/vinyl and all the small parts that get lost, but the body had accident repair and rust damage. I took the parts off the Red Baron car to build my GTX car. That is a very typical scenario. It is absolutely worth it to spend up to $1000 just to ship a western parts car to the east. Rust repair on these cars is a PIA, expensive, and time consuming. Parts removal and reinstallation on a better body is way easier.

Step back, take a break, and search for a rust free body. Even a badly dented one with no rust is better than a dent free one with "a little rust". There are many cars being offered on the Facebook Opel groups, I suggest that you begin your search there.
 
#12 ·
I totally agree with Gordo.... Step back... look what you have... also look at what has been done....

The problem with all that rotten Metal, is it's very discouraging to a Car Hobby Guy like you..
.. Your Overwhelmed with what you see... work, work, work, too much . It not going to help you complete the project.any faster..FWIW

If you really want a GT and willing to spend More money at this time,, You should think, or even go take a ride in a GT, Before you decide to dump more Hundred , thousands of dollars to make this one Run.

Finding one on the east is Hard,, but there are some that were Barn Kept,, or Garaged here on the east coast,, both of mine
GT's came from New Jersey

My Advise to You,, Is to find a Runner, GT Yup,,, At your Age It's time to tinker around, Have some fun and do some repairs,, that makes a Happy Opeler,, In my eyes Looking for a nice GT here in the East that been sitting around... If it Runs, drives and stops, decent body, some rust 3K or more depending
If has decent body not running, sat on cement Pad, or driveway
..."" Has a Floor"" Maybe 2K If it's Rotten, has rust rockers, floors , inside ,,, less than 1K or even Free

But,,, Hey these are my Guide lines,,, Just my advise..
 
#14 ·
Thanks everyone for responding. While the rust is depressing I can deal with it. A friend will help me with welding and for smaller patches I'm using rivets and seam sealer. If I had noticed all of it before I bought the car I wouldn't have bought it. I bought it as a project and a project it is. The front of the car is pretty much all set for rust and paint so I'll keep picking away on the rear and before I know it it will be done. I hear your advice to find a cleaner car and it is wise advice. Still, I'm not willing to start over. When it's done it will be done well. In the meantime, thanks for letting me vent!
 
#19 ·
Attaboy! That's the spirit!

You can actually do a pretty effective repair job to floorboards and such with fiberglass hair and resin. My Red Baron car had a bunch of it on the floor boards that had been there for 25 years before I bought it and it looked as good as they day it was put on and no more rust had compromised the area. I added a bit more about 12 years ago and it's still as good as when I put it on. The nice thing about fiberglass is that it will never rust. Metal patch pieces WILL rust.
 
#20 ·
Bob one thing about this forum, I don't think you will find a member that doesn't genuinely care and would be willing to jump and help your cause. Its just amazing how many caring people are connected to this forum. We like to share our opinions and offer advice that isn't necessarily how you would approach the issue. That's whats so cool about being connected to the best forum around. We can get great advice with knowledge and then do with it as we please :)
I'm enjoying watching your progress and look forward to an Opel just as nice as your other restored vehicle.
Time and money with lots of fun.
 
#23 ·
Bob one thing about this forum, I don't think you will find a member that doesn't genuinely care and would be willing to jump and help your cause. Its just amazing how many caring people are connected to this forum. We like to share our opinions and offer advice that isn't necessarily how you would approach the issue. That's whats so cool about being connected to the best forum around. We can get great advice with knowledge and then do with it as we please :)
I'm enjoying watching your progress and look forward to an Opel just as nice as your other restored vehicle.
Time and money with lots of fun.
I agree, the people on this forum have been very helpful and I enjoy meeting like minded people. That said, I can repair all of the rusted sections so the underside will be sealed from water. I don't see a way to repair the trailing arm mounts. At least two sides of each mount are rusted to the extent that they are not attached to the U channel flanges which are rusted away as well. I've been staring at them for a week now and I see no way to properly repair them. Maybe someone has done this repair in the past but at the moment, I'm dead in the water working on a parts car. Here are some pics as well as a pic of the Mustang I built and raced. I've worked on a bunch of cars over the years and have never dealt with rust like this poor Opel has. Lord have mercy!
Rust Rock
Reptile Flesh Boa Art
Rust Auto part Wheel
Land vehicle Vehicle Car Automotive exterior Sedan
 
#21 ·
Good for you for sticking through it. That's past the point of intimidating for me.

I'll make an update in my own thread, but, I took a day off to "finish" the bodywork on my GT, having thought for a few months "If I could just spend a weekend on it, I'd get it done". And in a 13 hour stretch I only managed to do about 1/3 of one seam, of at least a half-dozen I still need to do. I don't know where the time went, I didn't leave the garage the whole time. I hit that "why am I doing this?" point of frustration again. And I'm doing easy seams. Rockers and wheelwells would have scared me off.
 
#22 ·
I've hit that wall many times on my build to. These hardcore project that you, me, any many others have taken on get the better of us. It's always best to step back, take a break. Heck I took a few months off many times cause I d get so frustrated and fed up......it's all part of being human... Don't give up yet!
 
#24 ·
oh nelly that's for sure a surprise no one wants to see. As you said you bought it as a project and unfortunately when your tearing down to restore you find all the nice surprises you'd wish you hadn't. HOWEVER better to find it now and take one day at a time to repair then not have found it until your doing 50 60 or higher down the road and the bottom drops out if you know what I mean.
I'm sorry to see what your your seeing and I'm rooting for you. one day at a time my friend. besides the best part of it is your retired and have all the time you care to have to do what you do so well.
Keep pluggin away I look forward to your progress
 
  • Like
Reactions: 99449
#26 ·
I wonder if this is a good time to think rear end swap. You have to rebuild everything so why not rebuild it to accept a stronger rear end since I suspect you are going to have some grunt under hood when you are done. Seems to be trend in your vehicles. Others here could certainly give you pointers and there are threads that discuss the process but you are pretty close to a blank canvas.
 
#28 ·
I was thinking the same thing as Timbo. If you're already tearing out and rebuilding the suspension mounts, why not replace them with an IRS? No need to consider higher power necessarily, just, so that it can accept a better rear end.

I'm thinking, you might consider at the end of this, with all the pain in the ass you went through, it might be nice to say you got something better out of it than a stock GT.

That said, if you do want to just repair it and just don't know what it's supposed to be under there... I don't think it's a valuable part. There's probably guys around that could take out the sawzall to their parts vehicle and donate you replacement mounts and some floorpan for the price of shipping. Bit of a pain because a rolling donor is still a rolling donor until you cut away suspension mounts.
 
#29 ·
I don't think it's a valuable part.
The trailing arms are actually a super important part. Without them, the first pothole you hit will tear the rear axle off. They also preserve the angle of the driveshaft to the differential.

If you look at those trailing arm brackets you can see that they're pretty flimsily mounted to the skin of the floor boards, with maybe an additional bit of reinforcement. You could easily come up with a sturdier set up. Like, how about replacing them with 2" angle iron? A metal plate and two short sections of angle iron welded or bolted to the plate and sticking down, bolt or weld the plate to the car. You could replace both trailing arm brackets in one afternoon and make them stronger than oem. They ain't rocket science, they're just pivot brackets. Heck, he could put slots in the mounting plate where the angle iron bolts to and make his own concept of adjustable trailing arms.

Bob's a customizer and can think outside the box, I'm sure he'll conquer this booger in a jiffy.
 
#30 ·
IMHO, all looks repairable. The area around that one anchor will need some piecing or shaping of bits to rebuild that corner, but it is not much different from rebuilding a badly rusted out battery box area in a Manta/Ascona.

The idea of getting that area cut out from a donor car is a good one, Matt.

Just another trick..... Lapping new sheet metal of more thickness over the existing metal makes the welding easier. When you apply the heat to the lap joint, the new, overlapped metal's exposed edge will melt faster as it is more exposed. So, using thicker overlapping metal makes it melt at about the same time as the underlying thin body metal, and makes blowouts a lot. lot less frequent. And with the thicker overlapping metal, you can play the puddle back and forth between the 2 and control the heat going into the underlying sheet metal.
 
#32 ·
Am always fond of using bit and pieces.... Patches,, The problem is that your dealing with a uni body construction, It's made to be strong Unibody..way Once the Metal has been been Comproised thin, Rust and Rot and Rust holes it's not a strong shell, the body will flex more,,, So I would say Fiber glass not as strong,, If you have a plasma Cutter and Mig welder ,makes work much essier..

We all think differently,,, If it was me.... I'd strip the GT to a Shell... Get a Harbor Freight Trailer for $350 Dollars (( Make a Rolling Stand That can Be Transported))) Mount and brace the GT Uni-body
Have the shell Sandblasted blasted inside and Out
Blast Shops range from $700 to $1,300 depending on if you want it rust protected...
Land vehicle Vehicle Car Opel gt Coupé


Here's a Link From Keith's thread I think you need to read:
The $350 Opel Restoration stand


Then I would Cut out the floor and rockers and such while on the stand Trailer... You must realize by now that the GT sit nearly on the Floor... the trailer / Stand way will let you "" Work like a human again"" LOL and still be able to transport and move the GT around....etc... just some idea's

Again These are Just My Idea's ... To try to make the Restoration Pain any easier ..
My Advise I would use the Floors and Rockers that Opel GT Source Sells,
Making GT patches is not easy...
 
#35 ·
I looked at a couple of GTs on Cape Cod today. One would make a good project for someone. It looks good with minimal rust. I've decided to sell my GT or part it out. It's sort of embarrassing not finishing the car but it became more of a challenge than I had envisioned. I'm no spring chicken so I figure I'll find something else less strenuous to occupy my time. This forum has been great. Thanks everyone!
 
#39 ·
Sorry to see you go! Wish you the best with whatever future endavours you take on....
 
  • Like
Reactions: Bob Dugan and 99449
This is an older thread, you may not receive a response, and could be reviving an old thread. Please consider creating a new thread.
Top