brighton98 Posted October 29, 2014 Share Posted October 29, 2014 I have 09/10 Imprezas which both have small rust bubbles on the front 3" of the roofs. I'm guessing it's from stone chips. Is this common. and would a hood deflector help? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bushwick Posted October 30, 2014 Share Posted October 30, 2014 The roof or the hood has the bubbles? There's a difference If it's the hood, and the paint isn't chipped, then it might be a defect or bad spot underneath. A hood deflector will help with preventing stone chips, but will do nothing to stop rust, especially if it's already bubbling. If you have a car you care about or want to last, and it's driven during the winter where the roads are salted, you MUST take extra steps to minimize exterior rust. My best advice (for future preventative maintenance) is to have the underside oil-sprayed. This will add years to the car's life span as it helps keep the salt dust from caking up. In lieu of an oil spray, take the car to the wash it yourself pressure washer bays and spray the wheel wells (fender lips, struts, strut housing), spray under the entire car (especially under the crossmember in the rear as well as all around it and on top), spray under each bumper, open the hood and spray the exposed metal underneath, spray along the frame rails in the engine compartment, as well as the strut towers, get the oil pan sprayed off too. AVOID the spark plug wires, engine harness, fuse box, etc. Doing all that at least once a week (for heavy driving on salted roads) to maybe once every 3-4 weeks under light driving or below freezing will help the car last a little longer and stave off the nastier rusting that occurs when salt from Jan. is packed into crevices and resting on bare metal well into April. I bought a car in Oct. once that still had salt dust all over the engine from the previous year, but took a chance on it anyways. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
heartless Posted October 30, 2014 Share Posted October 30, 2014 those spots could be from stone chips (most likely), or it could be defects in the paint. A "hood" deflector will do very little to prevent roof chips - the stone would just hit a little further back is all... either way, a good body/paint shop should be able to fix those for you - without having to do the entire car. My other half had a small rust spot from a stone chip right near the top edge of the windshield on his new to him 2006 Outback - we found a shop that would fix it for around $350, and they even added a strip of the clear protective film to help prevent it from happening again. The car looks great, you cant tell where the work was done, it was blended in so well. on the flip side of the coin, another shop had told him they would have to do the entire roof - at about 4 times the cost... my advice is to shop around, take the car(s) to several paint/body shops and get estimates. If the cars are in otherwise good condition, it would be worth the cost to fix the problem(s) before things get worse. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
brighton98 Posted October 30, 2014 Author Share Posted October 30, 2014 They're on the roof, between windshield and sunroof. I have sanded of the rust, used rust converter and touchup paint to keep them at bay. Thanks for advising--I guess the hood deflector really won't help. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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