Tips & Tricks for Those “Hard to Reach Places”

Our customer Tom inquired about using a Hudson garden sprayer to apply Rust Doctor to repair rust on his truck.

Thanks Tom, for your question on how to approach rust removal. You can apply Rust Doctor with a Hudson Sprayer or any type of garden sprayer on rusty metal. However, the sprayer does not atomize the paint very well because there isn’t enough pressure in the tank. Consequently you don’t get a nice even spray as you would with a spray gun with a latex tip (19-22) or with an airless spray gun. The Hudson Sprayer works great for places that are hard to reach on your rusty metal as you can use the long wand to reach down into the bottom of a door or areas on the undercarriage. Painting with a brush will give you a smoother surface on rusty metal. Here is a link to our “how to” page  to make your rusty metal project look great.

Here are more “TIPS & TRICKS” on how to repair rust on your projects.

 Rust Doctor is a very versatile product. Here are various ways you can use Rust Doctor to treat and seal rusty metal.

•  One of the most difficult problems in treating rust is access to the rusted area. In car restoration, for example, inside doors it is difficult to get at seams and welds that contain rust. One solution is to use a spray bottle to squirt Rust Doctor into hard to get at places. By setting the spray adjustment to a stream, you can direct Rust Doctor at the elusive welds and seams. Follow-up by using a spray gun to spray the remainder of the inside of the door to completely stop any rust that is present and seal the metal.
•  Another method for getting at difficult places is to use a syringe to squirt Rust Doctor into tight locations where you need more control that the spray bottle provides. The syringe will shoot a stream of Rust Doctor into a tight location. You can easily control the force and quantity of the spray by varying how hard you push on the plunger.
•  To clean large areas of rusty metal, pressure washing will effectively remove dirt, rust, grease and loose paint in one operation. For storage tanks, car frames and bodies, metal structures and etc., high pressure washing will effectively prepare the surface for Rust Doctor treatment. If grease is present, add a cleaner/degreaser such as Grease Doctor to the wash water. Be sure to rinse the surface before moving on to the next step of using the Rust Doctor.
  
•  Before you treat metal with Rust Doctor, you must remove any grease or oil that might be present on the rusted surface. On very old metal, oil down in the rust is difficult to see. One way to check for oil or grease in the rust is to spray the surface with a fine mist of water. If oil is present, the mist will lay on the surface. Without the presence of oil in the rust, the mist will soak into the rust, indicating that you will not need to worry about a cleaner/degreaser. Try several areas to be sure oil or grease in not present. The Grease Doctor is a very effective cleaner/degreaser. Since it is a concentrate, you can decide how many parts of water to Grease Doctor parts you would need.
•  When treating metal with Rust Doctor, it is important to force Rust Doctor into places where metal is welded or riveted. Rust builds up where the two pieces of metal are attached. Foam brushes work very effectively at forcing the paint between the metal pieces. Even if you can’t force Rust Doctor completely between the metal, it will create a barrier along the outside edges to keep moisture and oxygen from reaching whatever rust could not be treated. This is important because the rust will continue to grow if it is not sealed off. If the surface is painted, rust stains will appear along the edges of the seam where the metal is connected if that connection is not sealed off.
• On automobile bodies, it is important to treat the front and back of metal body panels. If you only treat the front of a panel and then paint it, rust will migrate around the edges from the back side of the panel and stain the paint or create bubbles that eventually cause the paint to release. In some cases additional panels cover the backside of body panels, making it difficult to treat rust. It may be necessary to drill holes in these covering panels (this is inside the body and not visible) and spray Rust Doctor between the panels to stop the rust. This is the only way this rust can be stopped. The holes can then be welded or filled with rubber plugs.
• Clean-up is a snap with our Rust Doctor products. Many of our competitors rust products require using solvents to clean tools such as  brushes and sprayers. The water clean up of our products is not only a time saver when working on your rust repair, it is also much safer.  Rust Doctor is non-toxic, non-flammable and biodegradable.

Remember, if you have any questions about how to stop rust, don’t hesitate to call or email us. The Rust Doctor team will help you with your rust repair questions.

A garden sprayer like this can be your best friend when trying to reach those hard to reach area on your rusty metal project.

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