My '13 JKU was delivered to my dealer in January, I have owned it for a week. I crawled under the front and noticed what appears to be excessive rust across a variety of areas. I may swing by my dealer do see if others have this but for a $36k vehicle this is a bit much for a vehicle with 200mi on it.
I'm following this thread with some interest. We're awaiting delivery of a '13JKU from the USA. We are essentially giving away two '06 Land Rover Defenders that are completely eaten up by rust. We've also destroyed a Ford Expedition and a Suzuki Samurai. Living here is like driving on the beach every day. The salt is in the very dirt of the roads. The fine, salty, talcum like dust gets into everything, and then moisture turns it back into seawater. Aluminum in contact with any other metal turns into alka seltzer in slow motion.
We're going to have the dealer here Waxoyl this jeep before we even take it home. I've got POR15 already here to attack rust as soon as it starts. I've bought one of those upside down water brooms to blast the underside of it with a 4,000 psi pressure washer.
The problem with the OP's rust, I think from my experience here, is primarily due to a lousy prep and paint job. Surface rust does not form on top of paint. So there was no paint. I think the idea that it got splashed with salt water might be right, but if it were properly painted that would just leave dry white deposits that would rinse off the glossy paint. Right?
Any ideas on what else I can do to fight rust from the beginning this time?
This is the rear cross member on my 2006 Defender 90. A seven year old Land Rover with 30K miles on it:
They don't use bumpers, but welded cross members. Pain in the butt to replace. We decided to go for a Jeep this time. And fight corrosion aggressively. I even considered adding zincs but realized they wouldn't do any good in this case. My problem is salt, pure and simple.
Update:
Chrysler's official position is that this is considered "Normal". The oxidation is "normal".
Time for me to consider if there are any additional courses of action, to include my contacts in the automotive media, trade out of this into a different Wrangler, or simply walk away from Jeep entirely.
Update:
Chrysler's official position is that this is considered "Normal". The oxidation is "normal".
Time for me to consider if there are any additional courses of action, to include my contacts in the automotive media, trade out of this into a different Wrangler, or simply walk away from Jeep entirely.
The Service Manager called today and said that he, the dealership VP, and Sales Mgr were meeting this evening to discuss options and will give me a call Friday. Hopefully we can work something out.
The media is your friend, hate to say it. May have been covered or thought of already, didnt read every page, but I'd contact a local station with pictures about it. That's a story I'd watch on the 5oclock news.. Sure bet the dealer wouldn't want that coverage.
From page 591 of the 2013 Wrangler Owner's Manual:
Corrosion is the result of deterioration or removal of paint and protective coatings from your vehicle. The most common causes are: • Road salt, dirt and moisture accumulation. • Stone and gravel impact. • Insects, tree sap and tar.
• Salt in the air near seacoast localities. • Atmospheric fallout/industrial pollutants.
End quote. It doesn't seem like the paint and protective coatings should have deteriorated before delivery.
For what it's worth: checked underneath a Rubi and a Mountain edition on a dealers lot in Switzerland last week: no signs of rust whatsoever. Everything black and shiny. And they do spray salt on the roads there.
Dealership restated that Chrysler stated this was normal and they asked what they could do for me. I said, thanks to the Jeep community with some great suggestions and a neighbor Jeeper, I resolved my concerns in a way I would ensure it was done thoroughly. I did contact a friend at Autoweek who thought it was strange and asked if he could share my photos, not sure if there will be any follow-up but Chrysler can deal with that inquiry. If there are sufficient complaints, maybe someone will spend a little more money on prep & paint for the axels and other components.
I have come to grips with my disappointment and turned this into an opportunity to get to know my JKU's underside. With the 60-65 degree weather this past weekend, I decided to start fixing the axel rust. The rust had little to no pitting, it didn't take much for 150 grit sand paper to get to clean metal - some self-etching primer, 2nd coat of primer and then two coats gloss black paint. I tried to mask off any exposed bolt threads as much as possible. The result is what I would have expected from the factory. Still have a bit to do on the front components and then I'll address the rear, but I am happy with how its going. I'm also going to undercoat the lightly painted areas of body metal on the sides and rear pan.
Here are a before / after picture. The before picture has some rust converter already sprayed on it so the rust isn't as 'rust looking' as it was.
$30 to 40,000 for a new vehicle, shows up rusty and you have to fix it yourself? No wonder Obama had to give Chrysler away to Fiat.
How do you think he will fill out his JD Power & Associates or Consumer Reports survey on initial quality? Give Fiat Chrysler a 10? No wonder Jeeps are rated low in both.
Mine is fine but I am amazed at Fiat Chrysler not caring and how Wrangler owners are so forgiving.
$30 to 40,000 for a new vehicle, shows up rusty and you have to fix it yourself? No wonder Obama had to give Chrysler away to Fiat.
How do you think he will fill out his JD Power & Associates or Consumer Reports survey on initial quality? Give Fiat Chrysler a 10? No wonder Jeeps are rated low in both.
Mine is fine but I am amazed at Fiat Chrysler not caring and how Wrangler owners are so forgiving.
Some of these Wrangler owners are complete slappies / Jeep apologists... It's sickening... I'm fighting them on here all the time, including the mods, who protect shady vendors like Quadratec from any criticism whatsoever....
I read this Thread today and couldn't wait to get home and slide under the Jeep. For starters, I ordered this Jeep from the dealer and put the first mile on it on November 10th, 2012. This is not my DD so it has sat in my "heated" garage with a 35% humidity. It has never seen any rain, snow and has never been washed with the exception of a California Duster and one coat of armorall on the tires. I decided to take some pics and show what I found. This should eliminate any theory of moisture or salt or anything else other than manufacture defect!
You guys are funny. These jeeps arent defective, flooded, etc. Sure they may have a spotty paint job on the axles but some trucks just have bare steel.I see the undersides of cars all day long. Beach and east coast cars all have corrosion. Aluminum parts turn white with powdery corrosion, unpainted or poorly painted steel here's surface rust. You should only be worried if rust starts showing up on body panels. All this is is normal oxidation on domestic chassis parts. Chrysler is right. I looked on mine last week after seeing a few of these threads and mine looks like any Other domestic in socal. These parts won't rust through in 50 years.
It's cast iron, it's NOT going to rust through, but it IS unsightly. Especially on a Wrangler where you can see most of the undercarrige. Paint, rust. Paint, rust. It looks like crap. Nothing short of sandblasting is going to remove that rust so you can paint over it. You can wire brush it and touch it up, but its going to come back.
Sorry, I thought the pics I uploaded last night were on there. I did send and email to Chrysler/Jeep, they said to take it to the dealer. I did send pics to the dealer this morning and the owner called me back. They will re-paint whatever needs to be done but I told him I would rather do it myself to make sure its being done properly. The dealer did say to file a claim with Chrysler just to get it doccumented. I know it is purely cosmetic and has no effect on performance or stability but it just the point of it being "New"
My UK 2011 is not as bad as these examples. My 25 year old VW Sirocco was better underneath. The problem comes when you try to work on these vehicles in a few years and all the nuts and bolts are corroded. I cant believe that in 2013 car manufacturers are producing crap like this. And people are actually paying good money for the privilege. Keep complaining and campaigning ,
Remember what happened to rubbish car companies like LANCIA. tried to sell rubbish rusty crap to the Europeans and went bust.
I did a fair bit of crawling around under new vehicles when we decided to get rid of the Defenders. I would agree that from my own observations, if you crawl under a Ford, GM, or Dodge, you will indeed find crummy undercarriage paint jobs and surface rust beginning right away.
The thing is, you won't see it on Honda, Suzuki, Kia, Mercedes, BMW, Volkswagen, Nissan, and why not?
I agree we should keep pointing it out and complaining to dealers. Otherwise, why would they fix it?
And if most of the car manufacturers in the world can do it, why can't the US? It's got to be something as simple starting with the specification for the prep and paint surface of the axles and parts they get from Dana in this case. Just start rejecting the ones that don't meet the spec for finish. It'll get fixed right quickly.
Shoot an Email to Chrysler Customer Assistance Center. The only thing you will get back from them is a "sorry about your luck" response and take it to your dealer. But who's to say they won't get out a can of glossy black Krylon and spray over top of the rust and have your new Jeep ready for you in 20 minutes! Atleast by sending a Email they will give you a Reference # and an Email Case# so if enough 2013 owners submit it, they will eventually (maybe) have to deal with it. I myself have painted several cars and a perfectionist. I choose to do it myself.
I had my Wrangler in an independent mechanic's shop this weekend. I asked him if many newer vehicles have rust on the underside. He said a lot of them do and no manufacturer is better than another (maybe Rolls Royce would be an exception). And go to some of the "foreign" maker forums and you'll see these same complaints there.
I emailed Chrysler and they said I need to have a dealer diagnose the issue and then I can report their findings to Jeep Customer Service and go from there. I called my dealer and they said its normal for all the drive shafts to be rusted as they are bare metal and aren't painted or treated and the wheel arm components (not sure what they are called) will quickly start to get surface rust from moisture and sped up by the salt and road crap during the winter. He also said to bring it down and he will put it on a lift and pull in a new one from the lot and compare them... My dealer is an hour and a half away, should I even bother? ... All the dealers local to me are not nearly as accommodating and I'm not a fan of them...
I went down to the dealer the other day, the owner was in the showroom so we went out to the lot to look at the 13's and 6 out of 7 had rust on them (axles). The driveshaft and exhaust is normal so don't sweat on that. One of the Jeeps was in alot worse shape than mine, It was probably driven in rain/snow recently. Sorry your local dealers aren't accomodating but I've been in the same situation. In my opinion, If you trust your selling dealer will fix it and do a good job, then I would take it to them. My dealer did say they would get it up on the rack and re-paint whatever is needed. I do trust they would do a good job but I chose to do it myself which turned out great.
This is what I saw when I pulled the front passenger wheel off and crawled underneath. Quality control issue??? Talk about half a**ed.
I did re-paint everything. I used Por15 degreaser cleaner and it took pretty much all the surface rust with a swipe of a towel. I used Chassis Saver paint by Magnet. I had about $45 in materials and took me about 3 hours to to the front.
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