Is this frame too late to save ?

[Coveman]

That isn’t extraordinary rust. It looks like mine did before i cleaned it up, now it’s more of a keep it up project.

Yours also looks like it had been undercoated at some point, and when the undercoat starts failing it holds water against the frame and its off to the races for the rust.

I use salt away at the end of salt season and rinse the undercarriage every time I wash it. I use a gutter cleaning wand so i can rinse the undercarriage thoroughly (some guys use lawn sprinklers or steel pipes with holes to wash the undercarriage too)

Its a bit tedious rust busting, converting, priming and painting so i did smaller sections as I had time. Ill have to wait for my next fuel pump failure to drop the tanks and get that area up to speed, for now it just has a fluid film lanolin coating on it.

I noticed the gmt900s I have seen have corrosion in the engine compartment, so I gave it the same treatment and added splash curtains to the inside of the wheel wells (hmm, the gmt400s had the curtains, pretty sure gm wants our trucks to rust faster) That has made a big difference in reducing the mess sloppy roads do.

Our trucks have unpainted steel, aluminum and magnesium which leads to galvanic corrosion so if you can’t keep it dry it needs some kind of protection.

 

[Coveman]

BTW, that spare tire and carrier was a mess, I unbolted all that and went to town!

 

[vcode]

Hell yeah, gonna do that with the next one I get! Just have to pay on this one for a bit longer…

How bad is the rest of the body? My frame onmy 2010 looked better but I was seeing rust in door seams and the rear wheel wells.....

 

[B-train]

I agree with @vcode in that the rest of the truck will be next. I applaud the effort shown here by @Coveman as well. I, however, will run away from that project because I know how much other metal there is that is just itching to piss me off with rust bubbles......