Rear wheel arches, rust and a simple modification

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So many of our cars have this problem that I thought that a little DIY that I have done could help others, even if you do not have rust, most of it can be kept in check with a simple mod that will be in part 2
 
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Rusty rear wheel arches and a little modification.

This will be in 2 parts this part will deal with the rust and painting. Part 2 will show a simple effective mod to stop the rear wheel arches from rusting

Part 1 loosing the rust and painting

We should all check the inside lip on the rear wheel arches, and remove all the mud that accumulates there, in the winter months the mud has salt in it, this mud will stay wet all winter eating into the poorly designed upturned lip in the wheel arch.

Most car have plastic liners the fit over the lip, sadly the MB liners do nothing more than keep the mud out of the main areas.

This upturned lip is almost 20mm deep, so a lot of mud there, I use a toothbrush handle and water to remove it, then rinse off.

Most of us can do a good repair that cannot be seen if we attend to any rust before it creeps round to the outside face, for by this time the whole side will need to be resprayed.

Cars that I have seen that have been resprayed did not impress me at all, the colour match was not good or the finish had the wrong texture.

The pictures below show my 2002 SL after 45k miles and seldom out in the rain and never ever much on salty roads.
Picture 498 497 498 499
DSC00498.jpg

DSC00497-1.jpg

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DSC00496.jpg



I scrapped and sanded off all lose paint including any bubbles and lumpy edges as there will be rust under all of them. (During the time I did this work in Sept I still had only one effective hand, so the whole job was done with one hand) I used a scraper, chisel and sandpaper and no power tools were used. I was not intent on getting a perfect finish as no one could ever see it, so no flatting took place at all.

Rather than take the arch liners off, I pushed some thin cardboard between the liner and the top edge of the lip all round the arch, I was not worried about getting any paint onto the edge of the up turned lip as this would be covered later.

Paints
The aerosols that one can buy have little strength so I opted to use “Hammed” only and I used the “Hammered” in silver, as my car is “Brilliant silver” the hammered paint has a slightly mottled effect that is fine for under the arches and the little bit of face edge that shows. You may prefer to use POR or any other primers or undercoat paint that is up to you.
 
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Painting

Although you will be spraying from the inside only outwards the side of the car must be masked, as the shape of the arches will send spray dust air born all over the car and hammered can take up to ½ hour to flash off. It is necessary to de wax the whole of the edges of the arches so that paint would stick well, and us a 600 wet paper to give some adhesion. But do this lightly or you will go straight through the good paint.
Whilst getting the first couple of coats on one does not want to get too much paint on the edges that show where the go round up the sides so to start with I masked these off. Once 2 coats had been applied I removed the masking tape and while the paint was still wet, ran my finger over the wet paint taking away the edge and blending it in with the existing where it could seen and gave to further coats as I did not want to sand or flat anything. You can in the picture by spraying still outwards to the face of the edge that shows it has all blended in and no sanding flatting or polishing took place at all. Here you can see finished the front and rear edges

DSC00501-1.jpg

DSC00507.jpg

Now it just so happens that the Hammered silver is the identical colour to the existing brilliant MB silver so the last 2 coats I sprayed onto the edges surrounding the arches where they meet the sides. For those with other colours then go over the hammered paint with an aerosol of the cars colour, do bare in mind that you are spraying outwards all the time so there will be no paint line to flat and you get a natural blend on the corners that can stay as it left the can where the inner edges meet the side face of the panel.


DSC00504.jpg

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Once you are happy with the result it must be left to harden off, as Hammered takes a long time to go off, a heat lamp and heat gun are wonderful things, getting the work areas hot before you start spraying will prevent runs and sagging as the paint will flash off soon after hitting the work area. This method will also enable you to do this work in the colder weather.

When dry and hard I filled the rear of the lip with several coats of Waxoil and left to harden off a little before applying the mod as in part 2
DSC00511-1.jpg


The mod will be in Part 2
 
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Could a mod please put the above in the DIY section thank you
 

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Painting

Although you will be spraying from the inside only outwards the side of the car must be masked, as the shape of the arches will send spray dust air born all over the car and hammered can take up to ½ hour to flash off.
A good point there. I had stone chip protect all over the side of the car.

I still need to polish the sanding marks and lacquer...

We have an abundance of recycling bin bags. When sliced open to create a single sheet they make excellent masks as they stick to the car by static.
 
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You will see the car at some point in time will and you felt under there last year, I am a fussy bugger and if it did not look as though at was as good as when new I would not have posted it up here, I was so handicapped when I did it and it was very cold, you can feel nothing and see nothing where it blends in.

You will like part 2 and the mod that everyone can do to stop the rust in the first place
 

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Great stuff Malcolm.....waiting patiently for the mod!!
 
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Great stuff Malcolm.....waiting patiently for the mod!!

Yes it is worth doing on every car up to the 204, it should stop any rust from starting in the first place
 

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We have three mercs all 1992, a190 auto 250d, 124 auto 250d,129sl auto fitted with 250d. We are lucky no signs of rust on front or rear wings, Rob parker three pointed parts bought our other 124 auto 250d 1992 for his Dad, there was no rust on the wings and it had done 380,000mls. Just luck I suppose, but that is why I will not buy a newer car. Hope this helps
 

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You will see the car at some point in time will and you felt under there last year, I am a fussy bugger and if it did not look as though at was as good as when new I would not have posted it up here, I was so handicapped when I did it and it was very cold, you can feel nothing and see nothing where it blends in.

You will like part 2 and the mod that everyone can do to stop the rust in the first place

Looks great Malcolm, how do you drive with only one hand,do you mind if I ask you just what your handicap is (no not golf) assuming of course that it is not permanent,
Regards John
 
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Looks great Malcolm, how do you drive with only one hand,do you mind if I ask you just what your handicap is (no not golf) assuming of course that it is not permanent,
Regards John

Thank you :D:D Last year I managed to cut 3 fingers off on a circular saw, they take ages to heal and get any use back again and some 9 months later some normal feeling and touch is coming back again, never be perfect but I should not have cut them off in the first place ;):D
 

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Thank you :D:D Last year I managed to cut 3 fingers off on a circular saw, they take ages to heal and get any use back again and some 9 months later some normal feeling and touch is coming back again, never be perfect but I should not have cut them off in the first place ;):D

Do you mean you have had them sewn back on,

John
 

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Tight-as.. ;)

Brian got his moneys worth out of it.

would have done if he kept it but sold it for same money as it cost us. Brilliant car....makes me shudder when I see the horror stories on here on rust. All our cars have brilliant bodywork ....so to be honest would not part with the rest.
 

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That "mod" looks brilliant!

I thought with all the teasing about the "part 2 mod" we would be seeing the first 230 with dirty great chrome arches on it!
 


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