HeavyCal

I was working on my 15 Denali and I noticed the frame was coated in a sticky tar-like substance. Is this the wax dipping you're referring to?

German_truck

yeah. you can remove it with your fingernail (!) down to the bare steel if you scratch ... in hot weather it gets very sticky ... when it is COLD it gets brittle and can chip off.

both Ford and Dodge have been using hard anodizing (e-coating) for their trucks for quite some time. GM still sticks with wax-dipping for some odd reason (probably: "good enough" and a lot cheaper to dip frames into a liquid wax bath vs. hard anodizing).

demozg1000

I just got rid of my avalanche because of the rust factor. Im done with steel bodies. I had a gapping hole over the right rear wheel fixed in 2010 and it came back 3 years later and it cost me a grand to fix it. 10 year outer body rust through? You can keep that. And this one i had under coated and the dealers recommendation (which was probably a waste / overkill) I live in ny and go upstate in the winter snowmobiling. The frame of the avalanche was unbelievable crusty even coating it with everything from paint wd40 and fluid film. It rusted like a 74 vega. Rant done

groeder

I used to be a Dodge guy, but got sick of the body rusting. I looked at a couple of 2014 Rams last summer and they already had bubbling, so I went the aluminum route after not finding a used Ford I liked.

One thing I read somewhere, and it (and I) could be wrong, but aren't aluminum body repairs much longer lasting? Like demozg just stated, repairing rust on a steel body is not very cost effective because it usually comes back fairly quickly. I realize the repair is more costly with aluminum, but returns the repaired area to near-new condition.

Like I said, this may be inaccurate, but hope someone here could offer some wisdom regarding that.