Autoblog

The SS Belvedere emerged from its not-so-dry-dock almost two months ago, in all its ferrous oxide glory. Apparently the offer of restoration by Boyd Coddington has either been refused or rescinded, but either way, the Mopar is headed to New Jersey for a spa treatment. Safest Rust Remover, a product of the Ultra One Corporation, is going to take a crack at dissolving just the rust, and leaving everything else intact. It makes us wonder, once you dissolve that rust, will there be merely the lacy suggestion of a '57 Plymouth, rendered in mid-century steel?

A website has been launched so you can keep an eye on the progress. All reports about the Safest Rust Remover product are positive, and the non-acid mixture is used to clean Manhattan's Holland and Lincoln Tunnels. A vat half the size of an Olympic swimming pool might be needed, but maybe there's hope for the old girl yet. The game plan for the car is to not restore it, just clean it up and get the engine running -- once those goals are met, a re-unveiling back in Tulsa will be planned. They should get those Skoda bakers for the event so there's at least one perfect looking Belvedere there.

[Source: Hemmings]

Quite simply, rust sucks. Most any vehicle regularly driven during winters in the Salt Belt will fall victim to corrosion, and the various spray-on undercoatings available from the aftermarket have their shortcomings. Specifically, the spray-on application of these coatings often results in incomplete coverage, and what is applied will typically degrade upon repeated exposure to a decade's worth of abrasive road debris.

After dropping the fuel tank on our 1996 Buick Roadmaster, we found some oxidized ugliness despite the vehicle's near-impeccable maintenance record. Fortunately, the damage was caught before significant amounts of sheetmetal were lost, and modern technology has provided us with the tools to keep the situation from getting worse.

The US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia has upheld policy guidelines allowing the use of "regional recalls", which are campaigns limited to a particular geographical area. The National Highway Transportation Safety Administration issued a letter in 1998 that established some guidelines for automakers to conduct recalls on selected vehicles based upon an assessment of the local driving environment. Consumer advocacy groups such as Public Citizen issued a legal challenge to this, claiming that such policy constituted "de facto regulation", and violated the Motor Vehicle Safety Act by not informing all owners of a pending safety investigation.

Such a regional campaign raised the ire of Wisconsin's attorney general late last year, when GM elected to recall trucks in 14 selected states due to a brake corrosion problem, but left out America's Dairyland out of the fun.

[Source: AP via Yahoo!]