Door rust problem

[Finzky]

Hi Guys, Please can somebody advice me how can I sort by myself rusty doors on my B Class 2006 (Silver color) . I completely know that before I will paint or spray something I have to clean the doors, but I really would like to get advice what type of materials or liquids you would reccomend to use. It's not so bad at the moment and there is no holes at all but if I won't get it done now I'm afraid this will lead to massive rust. Provisionally car will run for another 3-4 maybe 5 years and then I will get new one only - so I'ts kinda important to delay all this rust for some 5 years. Many thanks in advance!


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[oldguy57]

Personally I would use a spot blaster ( about £25) to remove the paint and rust but go along the entire bottom of the door masking off everything you don't want the blast media to touch. Alternatively a really strong wire wheel on an angle grinder . I then would then brush on a metal prep and leave to dry- any remaining rust will show up as black spots and you can attack these areas again. Rust can be eradicated permanently if you put enough effort in. Prime and paint then in the normal way. One thing I would check though is the inside of the door where the seam is - if there is access treat as above otherwise I would brush a fairly thick coat of something like POR15 into the seam. Others might have better ideas.

 

[stagwcb]

Hi ,
You also have bubbling paint on the outside of the door so it could be harder to do as once you flat out the bubbles with wet and dry you will probably find the rust is more wide spread . If you can borrow a hand held snake camera you can check the inside of the door through the door drainage holes. To be honest trying to match metallic paint on the outside is very difficult you really need to spray the whole panel . You need to decide if just touching it in will be ok or getting it done at a body shop or maybe a chips away type operation . Have you thought of asking MB if they can do something for you .
Good luck .
Michael

 

[Wheelsnuts]

I had exactly the same problem with my 2006 A Class. The culprit is the faulty mastic sealant round the the door seams. It fails and lets the rust in. I ended up having all five doors replaced by Mercedes when the car was four years old. The seams were modified in around 2009 to address the problem. It might be worth contacting Mercedes even now.

 

[MB-BTurbo]

Has it got full dealer service history if it does Mercedes should do it free of charge so don't touch it until you speak to them.

 

[rf065]

Has it got full dealer service history if it does Mercedes should do it free of charge so don't touch it until you speak to them.

Mercedes goodwill repairs end after 8 years, I doubt they will spend a penny on a 10 year old car? Worth trying, but don't hold your breath.

Russ

 

[markjay]

If the car has full dealer history, you could try claiming under the 30-year anti-perforation warranty (APW).

Though from reading this can be a bit of hit-and-miss process, as it seems that MB Germany (who approve claims made under APW) inexplicably reject a high proportion of claims for no obvious reasons.

And in some cases they have been taken to Small Cliams Court by unhappy customers, and lost.

Still worth a shot.

 

[Finzky]

Thanks for all your advices. Regarding servicing at official mercedes garage - it was serviced at mercedes garage only on warranty period just because to don't loose the warranty, when warranty expired car was sold and after was serviced in non mercedes car dealer garages (I have full service history untill i bought it and even previous owner changed gearbox worth of £1400 for free because he had warranty from dealer which covers up to £2000 for any mechanical parts break down). I still have RAC warranty left for 4 months and unfortunately there are clearly written car is covered only for parts like gearboxes, altenators, pumps (no warranty for wear and tear parts and no warranty for bodywork) +before you want to claim insurance on warranty parts they will make investigation why part broke down and if they will decide that I delibrately broke it - there is no cover! I will call to Mercedes and will ask them - it won`t cost me, but I was thinking just to save my time and arguing with somebody I have to get it sorted by myself. When I got this car from my mate he was honest with me and gave me very reasonable price. From actual market value he took off cost to fix right side scratch + bumper (pictures below) + timing belt and on top solid amount of money was token off to sort couple of other things about which I will tweet in different post. Car mechanically is absolutley perfect have only 89k miles on clock and was not abused. Don't get me wrong but bumper and right side damage don't bother me for now (will get sorted later on) at all, but rust is very annoying thing which should be done as priority to avoid any dissapointments and high costs or loosing money overall in future. By the way to fix right side damage I`ve been told it will cost me £700 +/- and bumper around £300 - is it sensible cost to fix this?

 

[MB-BTurbo]

It's funny how we pay to help Mercedes market their cars. Rather than spending £100s putting rust right we should all drive around with big letters saying 'another rusting Merc', with a big arrow pointing to the offending area. I bet they would all of a sudden start honouring these claims...especially if you parked it outside their dealership.

 

[optimusprime]

Look for a pair of doors , for your car in the same colour . Cheaper in the long run .And silver is a nice colour i would think lots in the pick and pull yards.. No beating rust without cutting it out to eradicate it .Spend £200 to spray it, and the same for the other side £200 a lot of cash outlay . Good luck .

 

[MB-BTurbo]

Buying used car doors from 2009+ cars is a very good idea. You then get the better doors with better seals. Not that even these are prone to rust though. My doors were replaced with the new style and one of them is showing rust again!

 

[rf065]

No beating rust without cutting it out to eradicate it .Spend £200 to spray it, and the same for the other side £200 a lot of cash outlay . Good luck .

And after 18 months or so, the rust may appear again, or it may take longer if the repair was really good, but it will come back at some point.

Russ

 

[MickyP64]

It’s a very common problem; I have exactly the same problem on my 2006 W169 A-Class. Good luck if you go the dealership ESCULAB route, but I doubt you’ll get much out of MB.

There are a few here who have had this, some got in early and had their doors changed under warranty others were not so lucky (I’m one of the unlucky ones). I think as these cars get older MB are less and less inclined to help and will use any excuse not to do so. I also found that the attitude competence varied from dealership to dealership when trying to get any of them to undertake the proper ESCULAB paint measurement and claim procedure.

When I eventually did manage to find a dealership that would process the claim, MB head office turned my application down on the weak excuse of ‘time and mileage’, on a car that at the time was only seven years old and had approximately 35000 miles on the clock – neither excessive in my opinion. They did however offer a 50/50 goodwill gesture but my share of the cost would still have been in excess of £3500, so not worth it. They wouldn’t budge from their decision however hard I tried to reason with them. I did consider going the small claims court route but had already invested/wasted so much time trying to get the claim in the first place that I couldn’t be bothered with it anymore.

I did what Optimusprime & MB-Turbo suggest and sourced a full set of doors in the same colour, my doors come from two different 2011 cars and have the new type seam seal, though it’s worrying to hear that these too show signs of rust…perhaps I should leave the new doors where they are – covered up in the garage!

 

[Finzky]

I'm considering seriously now option to change all 4 doors instead of fixing current one especially that I have this nasty damage on right side + rust as well, so this might save me some quid. If there is known any merc scraps in London please let me know. Thanks to all for advice's chaps

 

[MickyP64]

I took me about nine months to get a full set of doors.

Ebay is a very good place to look; I got my front doors there. ASM Auto Recycling are quite big so worth a look – set up a reminder with them so that they email you with any new arrivals…You also just need to keep searching on Google too.

There are a couple of specialist MB breakers somewhere around Manchester, but I found them to be neither cheap or useful.

It’s also wise to view before you buy and collect them yourself if you can – no car breaker or courier company will take the amount of care over getting them delivered than you will!

Edit: Motorhog are also a large salvage organisation worth checking out.

 

[Finzky]

Guys from Manchester quoted me for each door £125 + vat - is this sensible price?

 

[optimusprime]

I looks to me that if you purchase a Mercedes you must expect to see rust at some stage of its life. I was not very happy with my Mercedes, but after 27 years outside and a little rust on both wings, and one rear arch i dont feel so bad after all.These will soon be fixd with original wings .And a new arch .

 

[MickyP64]

That sounds roughly the same as I paid, give or take some…can’t really remember exactly how much I paid but certainly around £800 or £900 for all five doors.

The doors look fairly straight forward to change over on these cars, they appear to be on a split hinge type arrangement so hopefully you should just be able to lift the old door off and drop the new one on without having to mess too much with hinges (at least that is my plan) - so make sure you get the door half of the hinge still attached! There might be some need for slight adjustment of course. The tailgate is a different matter that looks like a two person job.

There’s quite a lot going on inside the doors, sound proofing, electrics, pneumatics for the door locks etc…which is one of the reasons I haven’t gotten around to it - that and the fact that the only space I have to work on the car is on the street outside my house – I don’t fancy getting so far and then have to leave the car overnight with a missing door.

Make sure that the doors are from a car that was built later than 2008…the later the model the better of course.

I’d be interested to know how you get on.

 

[Finzky]

Just came from mechanic and had a lovely chat regarding rusty doors and nasty side damage after he done my oil and filter full replacement. In fact even if the doors will be with big rust I will still be able to get MOT. I'm that sort of person who keeps everything tidy, organised and ir right places and in he's toughts I'm just taking all this matter in bigger scale than it should be. I will stick to advices before and will just cover this with some coating to don't get annoyed by rust view and that's ir for now. I'm not planning to sell this car but just to drive untill it drives, mechanically it's nearly perfect. I'm thinking now to spend holiday's in cuba for week or so instead of changing the doors on my car. I much appreciate all you advices and support so fat and some of them was really helpfull to me.

 

[MickyP64]

That sounds like a far more sensible thing to spend your money on!...

As my wife said after she’d managed to put a large scratch all the way down the passenger side…‘It’s just a car!’…I guess I can’t argue with that…

Good luck...