I likely will…
They rust. They are buggers for rusting. If you had one a long time that stays garaged then it may well be fine but I’ve yet to hear of any manufacturer of anything metal that guarantees it for 25 years or more.
If you catch it early it’s not painful but if you don’t it’s a huge bill or dead - even if you can find someone who will do extensive structural welding and not many do.
At the very least I’d borrow a borescope and unscrew the sill covers and look into the inspection holes.
Absolutely true, had my arches done at one of the UKs leading mx 5 specialists as plenty do. Look at the wax oozing from the sills said the bloke when I collected it, and it was. You’d never put that much wax in a car on rust thought I.
6 months later and a week after one totally clean mot and I was musing on dampers and tapped the inner sill near the front. It made that funny sound and a bit of underseal came away and a pinprick hole appeared. I’d just bought a borescope as screwfix had them in a sale and they are handy about every two years.
The carnage in both sills was eye watering. The bottom of the inners was badly corroded all along and the strengtheners were so poor they likely had lost all strength as they met with the inners and outers. It was into both the A and B posts. The outers were corroding badly from the inside. The seat belt mounting was surrounded by rust on the passenger side.
The whole car would have folded in any collision, not something I’d want to contemplate with my 10 year old son in the passenger seat.
Economically the only sensible thing would have been to scrap it there and then. But then it’s one less mx5 and it’s my mx5. Basically it was braced, both sides of the car were taken out completely by a classic car welding specialist (who thought I was mad to save it) and many panels fabricated from scratch as you can’t buy them.
If you’ve recently done a shell up rebuild or as I say had it garaged from more or less new, fair enough. But do take note I’m not stranger to classics, I have many old Alfa’s which due to their reputation I always expect the worst. I was quite trusting of the mx5 and mine had been given two clean bills of health by the specialist who did the arches and the mot tester and it was still really a scrapper and not safe for me or more importantly loved ones.
Trust no one except yourself.
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Hello. A thread revival…
Has anyone used The MX5 Restorer in Pevensey, nr Eastbourne, for rust prevention treatment?
Or have other recommendations in Surrey / Sussex?
Many thanks.
I had mine done there as soon as I could after purchasing it. At that time you had to specify that you wanted the rear bumper carrier removed to address the nonsense behind it.
I think, rather than know, that given the NCs propensity to corrosion they now require a refundable against treatment inspection and that the optional rear bumper/rear panel treatment is an additional £200.
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Thank you. I called JR Classics. They were very helpful but they are fully booked for the next 12 months. So I registered for a cancellation.
In the meantime, I have booked MX5 Restorers for January.
FYI - another well known organisation quoted me £3k.
Thanks all for the advice received.