Removing Small Surface Rust from Bed Trim

Hello. I have small spots of surface rust along my bed trim (top near plastic cover and top of tailgate). I will include pictures. What are some best practices for removing and covering these small spots? I live in NY and salt is my worst enemy. I was thinking of getting some scotch pads and touch up paint, but wanted to see what others would do. Thank you in advance!

 

Light sand and touch up is good, but I’m still trying to understand how this happened. The one near the light is from rubbing and trim, but the others are too far out to be that. Is that a cover I see pushing down on the trim?

 

I’m guessing the bed cover is pushing down on the plastic and it has a slight vibration which wore on the paint. And I agree with ur idea to knock the rust off and use touch up paint.

 

@jassco Good question. Yes I should update my profile picture, I no longer have a cap but have a lighter diamondback cover. But I believe when the previous owner had the cap on, it did cause some rubbing on the trim. It is a 2016 and I’m happy with only having a small amount of rust like in these two cases, but am trying to prevent further!

 

OP- the cap caused this paint issue, almost every taco with a cap will have similar paint rubbing issues sadly. The leers/snugtop and subordinates are all made with 1/4” total overhang gap at the bed mating surface(meaning 1/8” between both sides)which does not seem to be enough for the bed flex. Hopefully you can find a good and cost effective fix!

 

get a small bottle of OSPHO. chemical reaction, turns iron oxide to iron phosphate (something like that). just scrub with soapy water, let dry and then follow the directions on the ospho.

 

Thanks all. No cap now, will try the ospho, thanks for the info

 

Test it on your paint, somewhere out of view. I have not had it react with any paint, but it is an acid...

 

pull off the plastic bed rail covers .. on my 2016 i found the top the metal bedrails rusted