i have a rusty quarter panel on my truck i want to deal with before it gets real bad. Right now it's not horrible as you can see in the pictures but i know it is not going to get any better. What do you think the best course of action would be in dealing with this? I would like to keep costs down as I have been sinking alot of cash into my truck lately it's starting to weigh on my wallet.

 

the only surefire way to eliminate the rust completely is to change the entire panel. which is expensive time consuming.
that being said you could slam a set of flares on it and be "rust free" for another few years.
doing patch panels yourself will be more work than entire panels and will never come out as good but are much more budget friendly.
assuming you are really **** about your truck like me, i would check out a few local body shops and see what they can do for you

 

i'm not tremendously concerned with how it looks right now, but I plan on having my truck forever and I dont want that rust to keep getting worse and worse. I was hoping there was something i could do right now that would eliminate or at least lessen the rust without replacing the entire panel. I wouldn't mind if the results weren't showroom quality but then again I dont want to make the panel stand out by doing a crappy DIY paint job on that part of the panel. Also, im not a fan of the flares so thats not really an option

 

Agreed 100%. There is no cheap/quick fix when it comes to rust. The only fix is to cut out the rusted panel and weld in a new one. Not cheap but it's permanent.

 

I had the exact same thing happen to my truck, what we did was grind it away best as possible and the coat the spot with POR. and then using a paintbrush got the inside of the fender, thats a PITA like you would not believe. then through some cheap color match on it and clear. Put the flare back on and it was done.

 

I have something similar going on with my hood. The paint is starting to bubble at the rim. No rust or cracking, yet...Worth trying to refinish or hide myself, or am i better off getting a whole new hood?

 

do they make clear coat that will prevent rust without sanding or anything?

 

these things have aluminum hoods...might be why its not rusting


if it's not serious corrosion, a lil sanding and paint might do the trick for now. even if it's more serious, I wouldn't look for a new hood until need be - mine seems to be progressing very slowly, and hardly knows what a wash or road salt protection is. lil different than the steel rusting-in my opinion, it won't hurt to leave for a while.


as to the rust....a good rust encapsulator would likely do the trick for a long time. but as said, the true proper way is welding new panels/patch panels.