Morning all.

Now that the rain has slowed down here in Cornwall, I was out giving the panda a once over. It's been under a cover for most of the lockdown as we only use it for the supermarket run & work from home the rest of the time.

When removing the cover I noticed part of the sill paint was black. After looking underneath the car I can see some numptie has jacked the car up with a trolley jack, right on the sill and partially crushing the seam. It must have broken through the paint and the galvanized layer & the rot has started. The bubble's in the paint and stone chip have water in them, and it can be squeezed out. Most of the sill feels sound, apart from a section around the size of a golf ball which feels a little crunchy & squishy, so that needs cutting out. Getting underneath, the inner sill and floor still feel solid, apart from the damage to the seam which is again about a 4 cm section. Seam on either side still solid.

Do you think this can be cut out & a replacement piece of sheet steel welded in? It's a 54 plate, but the rest of the bodywork is pristine. No rust so seems a shame for this to ruin the car. All other jobs on the car have been done, including cam belt & water pump, new wiper motor, new suspension struts, arms, brakes, tyres etc. We haven't skimped on maintenance so would like to repair.

I'd just like your thoughts & an idea of what price I should be paying for grinding, prep and welding. I don't mind doing the primer, stone chip and top coats myself.

Any help much appreciated.

Hi

Thats disappinting isnt it..
Very similar colour to our 04 panda.. which was also a 'keeper'.. features heavily on the GUIDES here


Have a good look at the rear beam..and its spring pans..

A known rot point.. it looks like your panda is likely to have incurred some other environmental corrosion.

Not much point worrying about the sill if the rear suspension is at the point of collapse

Thanks varesecrazy.

The rear beam and pans are quite corroded, but still seem pretty solid. They've been regularly hosed off so as not to trap mud and moisture with the pan drain holes cleared & the last few winters I even followed an old land rover trick & used a small amount of used engine oil in a jar with a brush and applied it to the components to give them a little protection. I try to give them a wire brush each year to check for thinning/holes.

thats quite a big Hole.


Its rusted from the inside.


costs £50 + VAT to plate here in Crewe


The car is coming to is end of life


It will be starting to corrode in other places. Thats the first place its shows
The other side is normally only a year behind


its done well to last this long. Most 05/06 are plated


it will pass an MOT plated


you have to way it all up. The cost of the repairs and the High road tax. Against putting the money towards a newer, safer car with £20-£30 Road tax.

most MOT places should have picked that up last year. They have learnt thats where they go and tap it with a rubber hammer. Its normally picked up before it even shows on the paint work


Been discussed in a couple of threads on here I started. One on it being a common problem and if you look at the mot history of older cars is nearly always had welding. The second was the first 08 I had seen with the same problem


50% will say scrap and 50% will say weld


at the end of the day only you can make that decision

Plate it is..

Worth asking about a tap around the rest though
IF this is the only spot.. then get it cut out and rebuilt properly.. will not be an issue for the life of the car then

Thanks Koalar.

It was MOT'd in December and failed on emissions (hadn't been run due to lockdown and a quick Italian tune up sorted that) and also required a new front suspension strut due to misting oil & corrosion. Front struts are now done. No mention of the corrosion & nothing in the advisories. It's never been picked up & depending on where I am in the country it is MOT'd in Dundee (when visiting family) or at home in Cornwall, with neither garage mentioning it.

I've been thinking about swapping it for a new shape panda for a while, but it's a bit of a pig having just spent money on the new struts. I guess I could run it until the end of the year and plate it in the summer & offer it for sale making anyone aware of the repair if they want to buy it.

Living in rural Cornwall I can't be without the car, so hopefully a mobile welder can do the work. We have plenty down here.

Jodsclass said:

rest of the bodywork is pristine

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On the outside, perhaps - but if you were to cut open the box sections and look inside, I'll bet it's well rusted in many places.

Cars like this have a design life of 10-12 years, and the safety case for scrapping it is strong; if it were involved in a major collision, there's no telling how the structure will perform. Also the airbags will be out of life by now (though the probability is that they'll still work as intended).

If I were doing a daily commute in a busy urban area, then unless funds were extremely tight, I'd want something safer. But for a weekly pootle down to the local shops in the country, it's not so clear cut, because the risk of a serious accident is many times less.

From an economic perspective, the issue is that you'll never know if its next annual test will write it off beyond economic repair, so that puts a practical limit on what it's worth spending to keep it going. If you plate this now, it still might not be worth keeping for any longer than the remaining time left on its MOT.

Jodsclass said:

I've been thinking about swapping it for a new shape panda for a while

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So, to turn this into something positive, you now have an excellent reason for treating yourself to a newer car.

Jodsclass said:

but it's a bit of a pig having just spent money on the new struts.

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On a car this old, it's wise never to spend more on a repair than you'd be comfortable to write off at the time of its next MOT.

Personally I'd probably run it for now "as is", keep an eye out for a good deal on a newer one, and just sell or trade it if you do find something else worth buying. If you've still got it when its next MOT is due, take it for an MOT to a garage capable of welding, put it through the test, and then take a decision based on whatever the total cost may be of what's needed to get it through.

Thanks so much jrkitching.

We used to drive up to family in Manchester & Scotland a lot, but the lock downs have stopped that. We haven't left Cornwall in almost a year & we only use the car for the grocery shop & to drive to the beach. Never gets above 30mph at the moment.

You've actually put my mind at ease. I'll monitor it and I will definitely start to look for something else when lockdown lifts. I've already seen a fantastic car on a 14 plate which is 10 years younger and the new body shape with only 10k on the clock. Looks brand new. We bought the car 6 years ago as a bit of fun with the intention of keeping it for 6 months before changing it, but we fell in love with the little thing and here we are. Coming from Land Rovers it was a big change, but now I love the go-kart feel and cheap running costs, I'd never go back.

Get the rust cut out and the edges "joggled" to take a repair plate. While it's open you can look inside to see what else is going on.

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Panel-Fl...697692?hash=item48e744e69c:g:A9oAAOSwx9xe6PDI

One of these will let you look into closed box sections
https://www.ebay.co.uk/sch/i.html?_from=R40&_trksid=p2047675.m570.l1313&_nkw=363252258614&_sacat=0

Rear beams can be replaced from £120. Add another £20 for heavy duty paint and its good for another 15 years.

The most effective rust preventive I have found is chain saw oil thinned with white spirit. It gels and after a while becoming hard to clean off, so keep it off any paint you don't want marked.

The problem areas are where bolts go right through aluminium brackets (gearbox, engine parts, etc). The last few turns of threads on the bolt get rammed solid with super hard aluminium oxide which tears up the threads on the way out. You can try to help the situation by regularly soaking the back of these bolts with penetrating oils but dont hold your breath on it doing very much.

Jodsclass said:

The rear beam and pans are quite corroded, but still seem pretty solid

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Rear suspension on mine looks like it came off the Titanic, never been mentioned on an MOT but it's definitely very rusty! Once the weather is better I'm definitely giving it the bar and chain oil treatment (or might use the old gear oil if it's thick enough!). Other than that, a bit on the sump (protecting itself with a very slow bit of seepage ) and the exhaust (thing's ready to fall off at this point) mine's pretty rust free. Mine only has 31k on it though.

I had a nice big hole in my sill.

I cut it right back and plated it, only took a couple of hours.

Apart from that one spot, it's rust free.....spring pans, rear axle, floorplan....no rust anywhere.....and that's all original parts on a 2005 car with 140k miles. The MOT tester remembers it every year because it's the cleanest Fiat he's ever seen!

Like everything, there are good ones and bad ones.....I'm hoping to reach at least 200k miles/20 years in mine.

There aren't many cars I'd be happy to do a 5-6000 mile road trip around Europe each year.....but the Panda has done it several times without a single problem.....and hopefully many more.

I'd vote for keeping her going, personally. Sounds like she's been well looked after.

I would attack it with a wire brush on an angle grinder back to sound metal and then either:
Treat rust and paint if not too bad
Get the rusted metal replaced

I would also treat the inside of the sill with Dinitrol or similar. I did this with my 54 plate Panda (rust-free at present). There's a rubber bung in front of the rear wheel, another one at the base of the b-pillar.

I like DaveMcT's suggestion of the smartphone endoscope type camera, and thinned chainsaw oil. Old engine oil is better than nothing to keep further corrosion at bay.

The sills on my 1991 mx5 started bubbling 10 years ago, were treated and kept her on the road for a further 8 years until I got my Panda. My other car is nearly 70 years old now, a couple of outriggers have had rust cut out and replaced, so I don't think a couple of rusty patches need to spell the end for the car.

rmjbn1 said:

I'd vote for keeping her going, personally. Sounds like she's been well looked after.

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Yup, if there's no other big issues keep it going if the car works for ya! Sounds like you've sunk a lot into maintainence so I'm guessing it's been looked after! As rmjbn1 says, knock back the rust and bubbling paint til you get sound metal, if it ain't too deep or affecting the structure in any way, I'd just paint it.

rmjbn1 said:

I'd vote for keeping her going, personally. Sounds like she's been well looked after. ....
So I don't think a couple of rusty patches need to spell the end for the car.

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Ditto.

From a technical standpoint this is no reason to consider giving up on the car, vehicle "lifespan" is just a typical age if its treated like a consumable without preventative maintenance.

The value of a car is personal to the owner, and so much more than the market price - only relavent if you intend to sell.

Same with crash safety, car tax bands, new car smell etc etc

All seperate personal factors and choices.

Best of luck with it, a good reminder for everyone to be aware that a little bit of laziness by a "professional" can cause alot of trouble! Good to try and check your car over once you get the keys back after someone else has had their hands on it!

I think there's a good chance the rust in your picture has gone right through. But nothing a good wire brushing won't expose. Then you can get a cheap endoscope inside and have a look around. It's my bet the sills will be pretty good and a patch repair will sort it out.

When done, spray the inside to protect the heat affected metal. And paint outside of course.

Technically it's uneconomic, but what will you be paying per month to pay off a loan or rebuild your bank account? I reckon even an expensive repair will be covered in three months of a typical used car loan premiums. After that, you are back into depreciation-free motoring.

RayovacWorkhorse said:

Rear suspension on mine looks like it came off the Titanic, never been mentioned on an MOT but it's definitely very rusty!

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Hi RayovacWorkhorse, there's a great guide by Charlie to dropping the rear axle to give it a good clean and rust-proofing here

It's pretty easy, just two (long) bolts to undo and the rear springs fall out

Tap the sill from middle to rear, bet you’ll find the rear is a lot thinner, unfortunately it seems they go from the inside out, although luckily it appears to be just the outer sills normally, so nothing majorly structural at this point.

yes it rots from the inside
yes it will pass an MOT the MOT can only test what visible and don't care about the inner hidden structure
yes it can be made to last for years.

I can pretty much guaranteed that rot is starting to set in

take a look at the bracket that holds the nearside handbrake cable up

Exhaust mounts

lift the bonnet and look at the front chassis legs closely. Follow the rails and you will see a kink which is designed to folded in an accident. Look down the seam for yellow rust stain

Then make a decision.

if its just the sills fine patch and forget

if its elsewhere I would patch then start searching

I have no feelings either way. What we need is someone to cut the outer sill completely off so we can get a true assessment as to the full extent of any internal damage

rmjbn1 said:

Hi @RayovacWorkhorse, there's a great guide by Charlie to dropping the rear axle to give it a good clean and rust-proofing here

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Thanks for sharing! Might give it a go when the weather is a bit better. Love your 04 Panda btw, now I'm tempted to paint my steelies white and do away with the wheel trims, not sure it'd look as good as yours though with the dark blue metallic colour mine is painted...

Need to get one of those rear deflectors too, but because of bloody brexit Heko ain't shipping to the UK!

RayovacWorkhorse said:

Thanks for sharing! Might give it a go when the weather is a bit better. Love your 04 Panda btw, now I'm tempted to paint my steelies white and do away with the wheel trims, not sure it'd look as good as yours though with the dark blue metallic colour mine is painted...

Need to get one of those rear deflectors too, but because of bloody brexit Heko ain't shipping to the UK!

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Thanks! Blue and white is always a good option White rims are a pain to keep clean though. I really like the steelies run by @testacorsa with MINI R50 centre caps, and @DaveMcT has some cracking steel rims (hopefully less 'cracking' than his alloys) on his 100HP

I like the look of the Heko roof spoiler, and it has improved fuel economy a bit, about 5%. I like a mod that pays for itself Hopefully they'll ship to the UK again once our beloved leaders figure out what they're doing.