Thread: Strut tower rotted

Well my left rear spring blew out on me last night... buy new rear struts, put in the LR with no issues... ripped the carpet back on the RR and the tower is a rotted mess. i know this is a common issue with these rot boxes. What do you guys recommend doing? or what can i do?

Got pictures of how bad it is?

I just went in from the bottom and grinded away most of the rust and welded in a new sheet metal in a few spots to maintain the strength there. Then from inside the trunk, used por15 and seam sealer to seal it back up.

http://i1105.photobucket.com/albums/...ps38d266d1.jpg

Yeah, you'll want to get in there and fix that before it gets any worse.

i dont have a welder... do you think a body shop would want to or would they look at it and tell me to get fcked

I'm sure some body shops would do the work, but you won't like the price.

They will go above and beyond what I did or any of us would do. Likely they would cut the whole section out and weld in from a donor car or make there own repair section. Most of us that have done it, just grind away the rust and weld in jerry rigged patched that work just fine and make it last another couple years.

my finger went through it haha i think the tower is a goner... I work at Firestone and we do a lot of body shops alignments so maybe they can help me out

I could put my fingers inside the trunk after I grinded away the rust and loose metal, just in a small spot though.

But a couple thick sheets of metal welded in from the bottom sealed the ***** right back up.

Mine were worse than that on my 98 I put a stb in to hold it off for a bit.

Man, and it's only a 2000. Reminds me of when I pushed my finger through the metal next to my pinch weld on my 02... All of my pinch weld is good on both sides except for the left side in the back, there's just a hole. Everywhere looks pretty good other than that one spot. I'm guessing the same thing applies? Just weld in a new piece of metal and paint?

This post makes me want to remove my struts, sand, prime, and paint those areas. They look pretty good as of now, even from underneath.

Ill ask them to see what they would do.. if its some stupid price tag ill go to a exhaust shop and tell them to weld some metal in it .... why do they rot in the first place... its in the trunk

Originally Posted by 02NavyBlue

Man, and it's only a 2000. Reminds me of when I pushed my finger through the metal next to my pinch weld on my 02... All of my pinch weld is good on both sides except for the left side in the back, there's just a hole. Everywhere looks pretty good other than that one spot. I'm guessing the same thing applies? Just weld in a new piece of metal and paint?

This post makes me want to remove my struts, sand, prime, and paint those areas. They look pretty good as of now, even from underneath.

my rocker pannel on my right side is junk to... not bad bad but its rotted enough to piss me off

01+ rarely has rust issue on the strut towers because GM added a plastic guard in the rear wheel wells.

And if you stuck your face in there, the rust happens because of the overlap in metal that isnt sealed up, water gets in there and rust starts. Hard to explain without a picture.

Ill take a look tomorrow... ill put it in the air and take off the wheels... if the car was stock id just sell it and buy a newer one... but i dont want to give up my 3.4 mods plus my exhaust work. ill weld the b.itch and seal the bottom where the metal overlaps

Amazingly my rocker panels on my car are absolutely perfect. Almost my whole car is in pretty good shape for 11 years in michigan, but there's just this.

But you can see it goes back to looking good after this section... I dont get it.

Well also, my truck lid is getting rust bubbles under the paint in the back, Idk how to fix that.

thats what mine look like.... im having it fixed though

I'd like to fix mine myself. I have access to a welder, but there's a problem. I don't know the first thing about welding lol.

get some scrap metal and weld away.. practice then do your rockers

i fixed it myself... i wasnt going to pay 1000 dollars to have a strut tower welded in... car is rotting away