August 3, 201114 yr The saga -and the never ending list of questions from the newbie- continue. Please be patient with me Soooo... both engines sitting on my garage right now have a fair share of rusted bolts and nuts. I fund this wonderful product called Evaporust, that does an amazing work at removing the rust from steel parts. Immerse a rusted bolt on this stuff overnight and it will come out in almost pristine condition. EXCEPT... it removes the zinc plating on the screws as well How can I protect the newly-bared bolts and nuts so they don't rust again in a few months? Will they rust in a few months in the first place? Out of the top of my head, I have used it so far in: - Some of the oil pan bolts - Timing belt cover screws - A/C and power steering mounting bolts and tensioning screws - Engine mounts-to-block bolts oh my... the list goes on: bolts for water pump, oil pump, separator plate... argh!
August 3, 201114 yr With the zinc plating removed, you are correct in that the bolts and nuts will rust in no time flat. I am thinking it would be better just to replace the rusted bolts and nuts with new ones. Ace hardware store has a complete line of metric nuts and bolts for replacements. They don't cost much. I use antisieize cream on all bolts that I think may want to rust and seize up, that sometime I may want to remove in the future. I use antiseize on the lug bolts and on the facing where the alloy road wheel meets the hub.
August 3, 201114 yr Author Nice... I don't see myself replacing this fasteners any time soon, though... I would need a list of every single bolt involved, and more importantly I would need to take this thing apart again... it's just not happening. My guess is that the corrosion will affect mostly the bolt's exposed heads and the through-holes that may receive a water/salt spray from daily driving. I'll apply a rust preventing paint to some of the bolts, but I was hoping there was something that could be applied on the visible bolts to prevent rusting... Oh well... I guess I'll have to keep an eye on this
August 3, 201114 yr Would it be a bad idea to use "anti-seize" on some of these bolts? I know I read somewhere not to use it on lugnuts, but Ive used it on intake manifold bolts before and some other miscellaneous bolts.
August 4, 201114 yr Author Hey! Where did that can go? That zinc-it looks like a good solution... why did you remove the post?
August 4, 201114 yr I HAVE NOT USED THIS PRODUCT ON ENGINE BOLTS But I have used sliver, zinc enriched spray-on trailer paint to prevent lug nuts from rusting solid to the hub lugs. The paint worked great, preventing rust even after the trailer was dunked into sea water on numerous occassions. Spray the paint so that it makes a paint "seal" around the bolt head. Do the same for the nut side. The paint is easy to scrape off when you want to remove the bolt. You might want to wait until one of the very experienced posters weighs in on this subject. There might be a reason to not do this that I am not aware of. Anyway, since I moved to South Carolina from NY rust has become just a distant memory. You get rid of your car only when the engines wears out, without snow and salt car bodies stay rust free almost forever.
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