the difference it its a lot harder to rub down 4 sides in a tight corner than it is to rub down a bit of flat sheet. at a minimum i would prime the hard to get to areas before they go rusty.

i used epoxy 121 to paint my chassis as it is primer and top coat in one. seems to have held up all winter

I cheated. I left it all as it was, then when it was finished, had it all shot blast and powdercoated!

Cheers

Adrian

The trouble with primer is that one of its propertys is its porous
if you leave your chassis for any length of time in just primer it will rust under the primer and you wont see it till its getting bad
if you want it to remain rust free you have to put a top coat on in a reasonable amount of time
or if your using a spray gun add some topcoat to the primer this will stop or minimse the porosity and hopefully stop invisible rusting
Ray:)

I'm about to start building and after buying some steel I intend to paint it with red oxide before even cutting it up. That way it should not rust and by only having a small amount of bare steel around the joint it will be less affected by weld spatter so less work cleaning after welding. :D

this is just my opinion ......;)

but alot depends on the conditions of the workshop/garage / build area etc to whether you need to paint the chassis "as you build".....

I didn,t & found that cos my garage was nice & dry, no bad moisture / damp etc..... i found that my steel did not rust at all during the chassis making stage.

But i know that Dogwood & Ash built there chassis,s in a more open enviroment so had the need to protect the steel more than myself, so as said... depends on the build area conditions.

or how about using a dehumidifier in the garage during the chassis build??? would this help?

cheers
andy

I wanted to get my chassis electroplated, has anyone done this before? Its cheap so the cost isnt a problem!

I painted the diff and front uprights with Hammerite. Will this be OK do you think? I had some on the shelf and seems OK at the moment but if it will be OK once on the road remains to be seen.

Should be fine as hammerite works best on a rough previously rusty or still lightly rusted surface like front uprights, the only time its not that great is on a smooth surface with no primer

It just takes ages to dry properly especially in this cold damp weather!

Do you know if this type of paint is going to adhere to galvanised steel tubes?
Thanks! :)