In all the volvos I have ever owned or looked at I have never seen a rusty one.
Even in 25 year old ones. Even in badly neglected ones.
If it was a ford or holden of the same vintage it would normally have some form of tin worm.
If it was a Fiat or Alfa it would be long gone.
It is a remarkable testimony to the build quality of the cars.
I am sure there are some out there somwhere
There may well be hidden rust in the gutters under the inserts in some or maybe I havent dug deep enough to find it.
We are lucky here in Australia that we don't put salt on the roads. That's why people here have a heart attack when they go to look at an old car and find some 10 or 20 cent rust holes. Get with it people - Others in Europe rebuild and restore entire rusted out hunks of shit, because they're used to it

Talk about spoilt
ICEDVOVO;8583 wroteIn all the volvos I have ever owned or looked at I have never seen a rusty one.
Look harder. They're out there. Both of these examples were offered for sale at grossly excessive prices by used car stealers dealers.

A recent Mr Rust. The thief has the audacity to ask nearly $3,000 for this pile of ferric oxide.


The original Mr Rust, which has a massive hole in the LH front sill panel near the jack point.


One really has to look at the cars carefully, and have some knowledge of where they rust, when checking out ones for sale. A couple of examples -

* In 244s of this vintage, there is often a lot of rust found on the beaver panel, under the top bumper rubber. Cars which aren't washed regularly get dirt trapped in between the body and this rubber. The rear of the rear wheel arches in 240s are another place to look - water that has fallen into the boot mixes with soil and dust, and settles into the corners where the lower wheel arch meets the inner boot corner.

* Wagons also suffer from this, especially when they have the old style (pre-89) cargo area window seals, which traps dirt and water into the lower edge of the window frame. See Slowbrick's "Irvine" thread where he's just done some rust repairs on this area.

* The clips which hold the windscreen in on pre-78 cars eventually rust, and create rust spots in the area around the windscreen.

And so on.

All cars rust. You have to look for it, and it helps to know where to look. The danger is that idiots think body repair is just plastering and rendering on wheels, and they will happily paint and poop structural areas which looks fine... for a little while. Crappy repairs can be a real problems with old Volvos because the local dealers want ridiculous amounts of money for spare parts, and some owners aren't 'car people', meaning they won't be prepared to hunt for parts or spend the bux to do it properly.
The early birds were not as well detailed but given they are 40 years plus the fact that many were treated as beaters in the last 20 years of their lives , especially in Australia as most dinky aussies hated volvos and their drivers with a vengeance, rust could well be expected in those models.

But show me some examples of badly rusted 850's

Onto the Volvo hate thing;
I remember around 97 I parked my 96 wagon in the school car park for a school function.
And this kid said to his Dad: "Look dad it's an ordinary person driving that Volvo"
It was a Sydney western suburbs school; you didnt often see any shiny new volvos there, but it still surprised me that in 97 families could still think that way.
I don't know what sort of person was supposed to get out of the car; maybe they expected someone with a suit and tie and very tish tish.
I guess the stubbies and thongs didn't sync for them.

Maybe they expected to see someone "pretentious"
FFS...
Rust repairs are best left for the pros.
I've watched many a mate struggle with a welder and grinder only to abandon it, either selling the entire pulled apart car at a huge loss or passing it onto a pro and then getting carried away with it rebuilding the entire car again at a huge loss.
Best to just stay away from rusty cars at the outset.

Having a battle to keep my Ford ute alive due to rust. Bought it new in 2002 and it has lived in the wild all it life.
Worst period of neglect was when I used to park it under a tree in the front of the house. Tree branch fell through the windscreen and a dodgy job from NRMA windscreens set the rust into motion. All that scraping off of the old windscreen goo obviously damaged the paint around the windscreen and instead of glass, rubber goo and painted metal I now have glass, rubber goo and rust. Too busy with life and getting my building work done to pay the poor car any attention. Condensation, rain, road grime and jacaranda leaves have formed a nice little compost coating around the affected area thereby accelerating the rust. If it wasn't for my annual trip to Bathurst races the car would never had a wash and it was only in preparation for the pilgrimages that the problem was ever discovered. I'm managing it now' trying to keep it going as car has only done 50K in 16 years, just trips to site and hardware store.

Anyway, it's something to watch out for - dodgy windscreen repairs and idiots who attach brackets to the roof gutters - for the sake of 10 minutes work of touch up paint someone leaves a rust legacy for the rest of its life. You see it everywhere, that and the door edges.
ICEDVOVO;134528 wroteBut show me some examples of badly rusted 850's
You got me there! :) I dunno squat about all that new FWD stuff. Except that the factory introduced a new gal panel dipping process in the early 1990s IIRC.

Some of the alleged "professionals" are why some of my projects are in such bloody awful shape now.

The problems are all caused by lack of proper preparation, and then poor workmanship on top of that.

My 1800E had a Scheib* respray done earlier in its American life, and the shoddy prep is now causing a lot of grief.

Xoe the 142 had repair / respray work done of her, and I'd had to replace a guard on her because the paint prep was so bad.

Chloe the 145 has had a respray in the past, and that is the cause of the numerous rust problems she has.

OTOH Clyde the 142, with very tired original paint, had surprisingly little rust in most of the body, despite a crappy RH door repair, inside which the panel beater left one of his dollies...

The biggest battle in vehicle resto is finding someone who cares about the results as much as you do.

yes. you need to find someone with a passion for old cars and doing it right.
and good luck with that.
But diy not the way to go unless you've acquired some serious talent for it at some time in your life.

My old dentist was into cars and did the panel beating course with kids straight out of year 10!
In the daytime he was filling and patching teeth but at night time he was patching and filling cars!
I always laugh when Volvo people whinge about rusty 140s/240s - yes, they do rust sometimes, but they are WAY more rust resistant than anything Japanese or Australian of the same age.

That said, newer cars are way less rust prone than older ones. With a couple of exceptions (some Magnas, Territorys), I can't think of any 1995+ model car that you regularly see with rust.
Fg falcons will rust inside the boot where it meets the c pillar and boot.
yep. common place for lots of cars.
best prevention: don't park under trees and wash the car on a regular basis to keep the drainage channels clean and clear the drainage tubes if you can get at them.
ICEDVOVO;134588 wroteyep. common place for lots of cars.
best prevention: don't park under trees and wash the car on a regular basis to keep the drainage channels clean and clear the drainage tubes if you can get at them.
True. Also the previous owner used silicone which didn’t help. But all good
Spac;134551 wroteI always laugh when Volvo people whinge about rusty 140s/240s - yes, they do rust sometimes, but they are WAY more rust resistant than anything Japanese or Australian of the same age.

That said, newer cars are way less rust prone than older ones. With a couple of exceptions (some Magnas, Territorys), I can't think of any 1995+ model car that you regularly see with rust.
I watched a DIY rust repair on YouTube recently. It's was for an 05-07 era Mazda 3 with pretty serious rust on a rear wheel arch.

Many cars seem to be treated at the factory much better than the 80's but there are many exceptions. Every time I see anything from Toyota (Incl Lexus) with compromised paint due to minor damage I see rust (or a Hiace which doesn't even require damage). Some manufacturers seem to use either no GAL or an inferior process, right up to the present. Unlike the Front RH fender on one of my 240's (88) where a few inches of paint was ripped off leaving just GAL.... That was 13 years ago and that car hasn't seen a garage since (probably for its whole life) and that bit of exposed GAL doesn't show the slightest sign of rusting.
Some manufacturers have gone backwards too, with NB MX5's being more rust prone that NA's.... they double skinned NB's to make them better in a crash, but created entire chassis sections that fill with water and rust out! Even NC's seem to rust more readily that the originals, and those go right up until 2014
Wino;134602 wroteSome manufacturers have gone backwards too, with NB MX5's being more rust prone that NA's.... they double skinned NB's to make them better in a crash, but created entire chassis sections that fill with water and rust out! Even NC's seem to rust more readily that the originals, and those go right up until 2014
I recall something about MX5's only being built for an 8 year life or so. Personally I really struggle with the populations perception of "Japanese quality". Thread drift.... But at my mechanics a few months back and he showed me a failed clutch fork off a recent Subaru with relatively low KLMs. I studied it and said there's not a single manufacturers mark or part number, who to say what went into this car?

Volvo seemed to really improve rust resistance from 87 onwards IMO and just got better through the 90's. Let's hope that the Chinese manufacturing (and base steel) is at least as good as the standards achieved in the 850's!
I struggle with modern car quality, but I know of several 90's Japanese cars with 500,000km's+ on them
My experience sure has been different to yours!
Wino;134606 wroteI struggle with modern car quality, but I know of several 90's Japanese cars with 500,000km's+ on them
I'm sure that many a Japanese car is capable of the 500K.... (Inferior body protection aside) Just feel really sad for the occupant doing such a sentence not knowing they could have enjoyed such a large part of their life in a much more enjoyable vehicle.
Oh no doubt. Guy at work has 500,000km’s in a Kia Rio, like a 2005 model. Imagine that... so much mundanity
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