ok so my 1st gen has rust on the edges of the front fenders and some on the back fenders. i want to fix it and im not sure how to do it. i was thinking about some bondo and then i plan on doing some truck bed liner across the bottom of the rig. i can post pics if you guys need

 

The rust has to be sanded out down to bare metal and then a sealer coat applied of red oxide primer, then bondo and then a few top coats sanding in between coats. To remove the rust use 60 or 80 grit sand paper. Do you have an air compressor? Air tools are a great time saver. If not hand sanding will work but will take longer. To finish, between top coats use 120 grit sandpaper and then finally wet sand with 220 grit.

 

i dont have air tools =( but ill do it by hand. um so what can i do if its gone through the fender =)

 

Replace the front fenders all together. They are cheap enough.

There are rear quarter panel replacements, but I forget the website.

You will have to cut to BARE METAL, and weld in new metal. no way around this. If you dont remove all the rust, it will come back and you'll be doing to repair all over again.

 

Replacing is the best bet if you can, but it some cases it is not economical.

Most of the OTC rust killers, naval jellies...etc pretty much suck. I have not found one that I like yet. I have a 60Gal compress which is really too small for large sand blasting jobs, but it still works for small areas. Once I blast the rust away I use nothing but Eastwood's rust encapsulator (RE) over the cleaned section. I have found this stuff to seal off a previously rusted area like no other. With a permanent top coat I have not found rust after years of the original cleaning.

The stuff is a little pricey, but it goes a long way. If you wait, they have a lot of free shipping offers if you sign up for their alerts.

Just as an example, years ago I bought a fox mustang hatch from a yard. It had some nice surface rust and even some pitting in other areas. I used paint stripper on the whole thing and a wire wheel on my drill for the surface rust. The pitted stuff was blasted. The quart of Eastwood RE that I had was about dried up so I really had to thin it. I mean it was thin. I just wiped this stuff on with a paint brust and when dry you could still see metal through the primer; it was VERY thinly coated. The hatch sat like this in a damp garage for 1.5 years and the rust never came back on any area.

Once I have this stuff down I fill with with bondo and start finishing. The bondo will sit on the RE and the RE will still provide a nice rust free and protected base. Once I get the body filler to flow with the body I will use RE again to protect the rest (it can be thinned and sprayed). If the rusted areas are still protected after sanding and only previously non-rusted areas show I will use a regular primer (expoxy primer preferred) as a non-rusted area will stand up to rust a lot better as long as it is top coated correctly.

 

i might just go get new fenders but i dont want the paint to be way off =(

 

toyotafiberglass.com

That's how I fixed my front fenders

 

With the age of your 4R the paint will most likely have some fade now. It would be tough matching it up.

 

i mean it looks ok for the age but its hard to compare to one with new paint.

 

yeah i saw that website, and i like the idea i just dont want my paint to be way off but i think thats just gonna have to happen. do you know how much it was to have them painted?