Inspect Your Drip Rails!

[Machspeed]

Hey gang, my little project over the past couple of days has been the drip rails on my truck. Back in the day, Ford used some kind of crappy sealer in those drip rails that is very rigid and with expansion and contraction will eventually crack, allow water seepage and subsequent rust and rot. From what I've read, this is not uncommon. Unfortunately, I did not notice this going on until just a couple of months ago.

[86 12 Brutus]

The ones on Brutus are pretty rough as well, when we painted it, i took a wire wheel and scrubbed down in there as best i could. I dont see any rust, but is still rough looking down in there. do these things come off? I know the ones on my ranchero do, but these look like they are part of the cab

[Gary Lewis]

Wow, John, those are ugly! What are your plans?

[ArdWrknTrk]

I don't think the caulk was crappy and brittle 35 years ago.

Time takes its toll, and certainly in the building trades materials science has improved a lot since then.

If I returned to an exterior trim job I'd done back then I'd be amazed if it were still sealed.

And houses don't flex and vibrate nor see 60 mph winds every day.

They also don't reach the scorching temperatures of black metal in the sun.

I'm not saying this to be contrarian. Just pointing you to the perspective of the drip rail.

Yes, I have taken a scraper and ripped that caulk out to replace it.

But I didn't use butyl caulk like it was. I used a low modulus urethane in hopes that it would flow into the joint a bit and bond tenaciously.

[86 12 Brutus]

I don't think the caulk was crappy and brittle 35 years ago.

Time takes its toll, and certainly in the building trades materials science has improved a lot since then.

If I returned to an exterior trim job I'd done back then I'd be amazed if it were still sealed.

And houses don't flex and vibrate nor see 60 mph winds every day.

They also don't reach the scorching temperatures of black metal in the sun.

I'm not saying this to be contrarian. Just pointing you to the perspective of the drip rail.

Yes, I have taken a scraper and ripped that caulk out to replace it.

But I didn't use butyl caulk like it was. I used a low modulus urethane in hopes that it would flow into the joint a bit and bond tenaciously.

You make a good point Jim. you know alot of times, I find myself saying stuff like that " what were they thinking" " boy this is crappy work" etc and then you realize the truck is Old, heck, i still think of the 95 vic as a newer car, well it is newer then Brutus, but it's old too.

 

[ArdWrknTrk]

You make a good point Jim. you know alot of times, I find myself saying stuff like that " what were they thinking" " boy this is crappy work" etc and then you realize the truck is Old, heck, i still think of the 95 vic as a newer car, well it is newer then Brutus, but it's old too.

Best practices change over time as we gain better understanding and newer products to work with.

You do what you can with what you've got.

Sealants have come a long way from pine pitch and tar.

But it has also been a long long time since I've installed Fir gutters on a house.

[86 12 Brutus]

Best practices change over time as we gain better understanding and newer products to work with.

You do what you can with what you've got.

Sealants have come a long way from pine pitch and tar.

But it has also been a long long time since I've installed Fir gutters on a house.

Thats just like the cowl behind the hood, we had to take ours off because , well first and foremost, it was full of leaves ( now that is just a bad design on Fords part and was fixed for 87 model year ) but the sealer they used had all rotted away, it was back in the day of foam weatherstripping. It's what they had at the time and nobody had any idea that it would just get hard and disentigrate over time.

We ended up using some leftover sealer strips from our roof.

You could also understand because the truck is out in the weather, but even inside of a climate controled environment it happens, just at a slower rate. I replaced the foam surround on my warfedale speakers about 15 years ago, i could have used rubber, but i wanted to use what they used, but needless to say, it's time to do them again as the foam is beginning to disintegrate. They did the best they could with the tech they had at the time.

[Machspeed]

Best practices change over time as we gain better understanding and newer products to work with.

You do what you can with what you've got.

Sealants have come a long way from pine pitch and tar.

But it has also been a long long time since I've installed Fir gutters on a house.

Jim, agree on the product of the time, though my 69 Mustang never developed this issue. And, this is not a common problem on those cars as it is with our trucks. Be interesting to see if they used a different product then. The stuff I took out of there was like bondo, only much harder. The products available to us today are far superior, though. I will be using a 3M 2k product to seal the drip rails.

Gary, l used a rust converter, cut out all the bad metal and welded in patches. Sprayed epoxy primer last night and will use some metal to metal filler to clean it up before repaint of the roof.

[ArdWrknTrk]

Jim, agree on the product of the time, though my 69 Mustang never developed this issue. And, this is not a common problem on those cars as it is with our trucks. Be interesting to see if they used a different product then. The stuff I took out of there was like bondo, only much harder. The products available to us today are far superior, though. I will be using a 3M 2k product to seal the drip rails.

Gary, l used a rust converter, cut out all the bad metal and welded in patches. Sprayed epoxy primer last night and will use some metal to metal filler to clean it up before repaint of the roof.

As i said, it seems like butyl to me.

That stuff was tenacious! (and stringy)

It used to be used a lot on storm doors and triple track windows.

Would be resilient, almost gummy once it dries.

Too much VOC's and cleanup was a problem.

But it stuck to everything and did not let go.

[86 12 Brutus]

Wow, John, those are ugly! What are your plans?

John the ones on my 79 ranchero are perfect, i went take a closer look at Brutus and i do see some small rust down there. do these things come off? does anybody know.