need some advice on Chassis Saver

[c10chevy81]

Hello everyone, I am repainting the frame on my c10 and need some advice. This is my first time painting a frame, and i want it to last. Well heres my problem, as soon as i had the truck stripped i began wire wheeling all the old paint and rust off. So now my frame is bare metal, and i picked up a gallon of Chassis Savor only to realize it says you cant paint a bare metal frame. So my question is if i prime it first will the paint hold up well? also can anyone recommend a good primer? and has anyone had any luck with Chassis Saver, im told this stuff is supposed to work great, but id hate to paint it and have to come back and do it again lol.

[Mr Diesel]

It won't stick, even if you prime it. It will look great at first. Then one day you will accidentally hit it with the power washer and it will come up in huge chunks. You will look closer and realize that underneath those huge flakes of ChassisSaver it has been rusting all along, because the water seeped into a crack in the paint and worked its way underneath to do its damage.
Chassis saver has great cohesion. It sticks well to itself. It has very poor adhesion to anything except heavily pitted, porous metal. A lot of people will disagree with me here, but I am not a fan of the stuff.

Go get some Rustoleum "professional" black enamel paint and just spray several coats of it on. A gallon jug costs $25-$30. If you really want it to last topcoat it with a good quality clearcoat.

[bake74]

     I personally have not used chassis saver.  I have used por-15 on my axles, and they are still coated as the day I painted them, it is important to follow the directions.  Sorry could not be more help, if you want to use chassis saver, spray water on it, wait a couple of days till the oxidation sets in and then coat it.

[Captkaos]

If you polished up the frame with a wire wheel, not much is going to stick as it won't have any bite to it.  Realistically you could have scuffed the whole thing up removed the flaky rust if present and painted right over everything.

To get either POR15 or Chassis saver to stick on bare metal it needs to be blasted.

This is from Chassis Savers site:

Q: Do I need a primer under Chassis Saver?
A: Chassis Saver™ has been formulated for application directly to clean sandblasted steel or right over tightly adhering rust and scale. Only if your surface to be painted is completely smooth will you need a primer. If you can not sandblast or mechanically abrade the surface before applying Chassis Saver™, a primer such as our 300 Series Universal Automotive Primer or 1900 Series MAGNAPOXY™ Epoxy Primer should be used. Self etching primer from commercially available sources will also provide adhesion to smooth metal.

[Blazin]

Your best bet is to sand blast it for clean metal adhesion. If not sand blasted then needle scale the heavy rust areas. Any bare metal spray it down with water, let it sit outdoors for a week or so. Get the orange color of rust all over it. If you want to speed up the rusting spray it down with Dupont's 244S etching liquid. Then spray water on it a few hours later. As far as old paint, sand or scuff it down with 180 or 220 paper, then paint around it with Chassis Saver. Then top coat the whole thing with and acrylic enamel. It is best to top coat within an hour to 6 or 8 hours of applying the Chassis Saver. Have used Chassis Saver, and POR15 this way many times.
Most of the roof on my 55 is brush painted with Chassis Saver, After I sanded all the surface rust with 80 grit, then 180 grit paper on a DA. Then primed with several coats of high build urethane primer.  Sanded, and top coated with acrylic enamel.

I sand blasted the rims on my truck, left them out doors for about a month. Brought them in, took a brand new hand held wire brush to them. Blew them off with air, then brushed them with Chassis Saver, then sprayed acrylic enamel over it about an hour later. They have held up spectacular for 3 plus years now.
Did the same with my front bumper, except I top coated it with SEM spray on bed liner. Rear bumper was a piece of I beam that had been laying out doors for about 8 years. Needle scaled it, Chassis Saver, and top coat with SEM bed liner. It has a couple small chips on the very edge after 3 plus years of backing into snow banks, winter sand piles, climbing in and out, dragging chains across it. And the inside edge of the D rings are scraped off from chains.



Chassis Saver:


SEM:


Right after spraying them. I forgot to take pics of them before!:


Same wheels almost three years later. At that point they had winter and summer tires swapped on and off twice. Plus run in the winter, plowing etc.:


Bumper last winter:

[bake74]

     Blazin, that is a really cool plow truck.  Just had to say that.

[Blazin]

Thank you!