Media blast vs Dipping Panels
 

I have been getting conflicting info about which is the better choice......especially when it comes to doors. Cost appears to be close to the same for each method. Any other opinions I can get would be appreciated.

I have no experience with dipped panels. But I would imagine the prep for epoxy primer is the same as with a chemical stripper.... Wash the product good and scrub with a scotch-brite to nuetralize the acid.

Where as media blasiting you can blow the panel off good, buzz over it with a DA and go to priming.




EDIT... Oh and neutralizing acid inside a door wouldnt be my first choice of fun tasks.. Much rather deal with a little sand than try to scrub the inside of my doors

I think the justification of dipping is that it would get all the crap that has accumulated over the years. Especially the doors, where water and debris can sit and you can get rot from the inside out. Once it is chemically stripped, a good rust treatment inside the door will ensure no future issues. That's how it was explained to me.

I have heard two completely different sides to this. I have heard it works wonders and I have heard some of the acid is left behind in the body and wrecks it later. Also it will get some nasty rust fast if it isn't dipped in primer.

All I can tell you is that over a year after getting the car back together I still have plastic media dust falling out every time I drive it.

I had my car dipped. I have mixed feelings about it. The car itself was very rusty. I had replaced as much sheet metal with better parts as possible, and the replaced metal was in good usable shape. Those parts after dipping came back looking like brand new parts. They were beautiful. Clean, no surface warping or texture from media. Of course the edges were sharp and I had to be careful of slicing my hands open.

The body was another story. The body was really rusty. Dipping didn't get all the rust off like I had hoped it would. I even took it back and had it dipped a second time. Still didn't remove all the rust in the recessed areas, crevices, etc. Don't expect it to get the rust in the pinched weld seams. Then again, media blasting won't get in the seams, either.

Now, my car is still apart. I'm doing it myself and I can only work on it so often. I didn't primer it right away, as I'm taking it apart and replacing panels, etc. It didn't rust over on me unless I got it wet. That seemed to reactivate the acid trapped in the seams.

From what I've read it can do this for up to a year afterwards. I'm only 6 months through. I've been spraying areas I've fixed up with rust encapsulator and it's working well.

I have pics on my build thread. I hope this helps.

https://lateral-g.net/forums/showthread.php4?t=26338

-Brendon