Just bought a 96 with some rust....

So a few weeks ago I sold my 05 double cab and picked up a 96 extracab V6/Auto 4x4. I needed to pay some stuff off and felt a little silly using my newest vehicle as a winter beater. Anyhow I bought this 96 with 250k on it. 1 owner truck, really clean body and interior, and it runs/drives great. The frame was bit crusty and I suspect others were suspect of it too and I got it pretty cheap. It passed the Toyota frame inspection 2 years ago and of course now it doesn't qualify. And it never got coated by Toyota. So I'm in the process of cleaning it up to coat it myself inside and out with a bunch of rust products I bought from Eastwood that I have used before on other restoration projects. The stuff worked great on my FJ40. So the last few hours I've spent banging on everything with a hammer and wire brushing everything. Well I punched a hole directly in the bottom of the framerail right near the catalytic converter. It's only about an inch round area. I'm going to cut it out and weld a plate on. The entire passenger side framerail feels like it's full of rust. Yet the driver's side is pretty clean. I've been whaling on it pretty good with a pick hammer and I've only gone through in that one spot. I'm thinking of actually cutting a few more holes in the bottom to get the rust out. Any thoughts? Any other areas I should look at more closely? My dad's 98 got bought back by Toyota but I don't where it actually rusted through. I suspected the area by the rear spring hangers would be the worst but mine's solid there.

 

Well I thought it was solid. Got out my pick hammer and went through near the spring hanger. So I took off the exhaust and cut it out.





One good thing about big holes in the frame is that I was able to get all the loose rust out!



I sprayed a can of eastwood's internal frame coating in each framerail after blowing them both out with compressed air. I also dragged a magnet through each side going through the holes to drag out any big chunks of loose rust. I hope this stuff works as advertised and keeps it from getting any worse. Thank god I couldn't go through it on the driver's side. I really didn't want to drop the tank too. Oddly enough the driver's side had almost no loose scale inside the frame. But there was tons in the passenger side. I've already welded up the big hole but ran out of welding wire (and gas) working on the second one. I'll have to finish later in the week. This one will live on!

 

Looks rough. I would weld some reinforcement plates around that also.

 

I'm going over everything with 1/8" plate steel. I could actually see inside the frame quite a bit and it's all solid except where I cut out. After I found the second spot I went all over the thing whaling on it with my pick hammer. And I used a chisel to get in behind the tank. I didn't find anything else. So I'm just patching these up with plate. And I coated the inside and outside of the frame. I'll see what happens...

 

I'm probably one of the few that believes patching it is a safe option and it sounds like you got it figured out. Good plan.

 

Honestly this is nothing compared to the rust I encountered on my last few restoration projects. Although I'm glad Toyota stepped up to the plate and covered these trucks for 15 years against this I think the general public has condemned these older trucks wrongly. This can be fixed if gone about properly. The key is catching it before it's a major issue.

 

I am sorry but thats ridiculous, that is not regular common frame rust normally found on 10-15 or even 40 year undercarriages pay particular attention to the color it's very reddish dark black at spots this is the incideous type that destroys. (Not that all rust/cancer dosent turn metal back into soil) Most vehicles of this age will have corrosion on the undercarriage but its more of cinnamon color thats consistant and bordering on a surface rust that's easily removed.

I have seen battery trays out of 60's cars that are in better shape or helped my buddy and his dad pull 20's & 30's era truck out of fields were god knows how long they have sitting in the weeds that are way more solid.

 

As everyone, we all have our own opinions. Personally I have seen some rusted frames in my life, and I would not want to try and repair that much. The time and $$$ alone would be more than I would care to spend. Personally I would look in junk yards and other locations to find a truck that has a good frame in it and swap them out. But that is my opinion.

 

Actually this is far less rust damage than my FJ40 had which lived in PA most of it's life. Proper coating and repair and 10 years later there still isn't any rust on the undercarriage. Of course that doesn't go out in the salt and this truck is going to be my winter beater. This thing has 250k on it. I'll keep on patching it if it gets worse but the other framerail is rock solid and what is rusted out now is actually far thinner steel than what I am replacing it with. And yes other trucks of this age have rusted out this badly. I have a friend who scraps cars and he's constantly picking up late 90's early 00's GM fullsize trucks with rotted frames. Made by the same company that made this frame.... He had an early 00's super duty with frame rot also. Toyota really stepped up to the plate and covered these trucks but if the proper treatment is done before they are too far gone they can be saved. Fingers crossed this one won't get any worse. But if it does I'll have to fix it. I need this truck to last another few years.

 

If you are familiar with doing the work then by all means do it. These are great little trucks and it's a shame that so many of them were taken off the road (but I benefited from it too...so I'm not complaining).
My friend did a 60 series frame swap in his driveway so anything's possible.

 

Yea but Chevy’s & Fords aren’t well known for rotted frames....

Anyway it’s a shame some body doesn’t make whole frames of repair sections. After you clean it up as much possible Por-15 is some amazing stuff.

 

Well here it is with patches welded over the holes, frame emptied of loose scale, Eastwood internal frame coating, Eastwood rust encapsulator on the outside, and a topcoat of Eastwood rust encapsulator undercoating. The undercoating sprays more like a chassis paint so it doesn't have bubbles in it. But it remains flexible and is twice as resistant to rust as their regular rust encapsulator. We'll see how it looks come spring.... I'll probably wind up oiling the inside of the frame too.







If it's bleeding through come spring I'll likely wind up tearing the cab and bed off next summer to sandblast the chassis and do it over again. On my FJ40 below I sandblasted the chassis and used the same rust encapsulator and a topcoat of chassis black. 10 years later it still looks great. And this was originally rustier than the Tacoma.