This morning I pulled out the carpet to check for any wires that may be damages. (im having a slow battery drain.) Well I noticed that the sealent stuff gm used to seal the welds on the body seam was cracking. This is covering the seam that runs across the car from the drivers side to the passengers side about mid ways between the front hald and the back half of the car. Well after a little poking with a screw driver I realise that its cracking from some majior rust thats building up on the weld. So i chip some of it off and sure enough the rust is whats causing it. This isnt just a lil surface rust this is full on corrosion. Its bad enough im going to have to repair the weld in a few places.

The car doesnt have any leaks or anything like that, and hasnt since i have owned the car. It could be from a previous owner or it could be from someone spilling something back there. But i doubt its from any of those things as the rust is the same "consistency" all the way up the tranny tunnel. I also noticed the things that are holding the wires to the floor pan are rusting too. I plan on removing them and removing all the "glue" thats holding them on and then cleaning all the rust off of them and painting them with the por15. Then reattaching them with some clear silicone.

So im working on sanding it all down and am going to have to repair the weld in a few places. Then i will coat it with some por15 and then i plan on painting the whole floor pan with some flat black rust prevenative paint just to besure everything is sealed. This is weird becuse this car is a southern car and has never seen snow or road salt. I have no idea where this rust came from but it is something you all should check out.

Can someone post a pic of the floor pan with the carpet out? I can show you the seam im talking about with a pic.

 

Wow! Rust on the floorpan of a 94! That's a first for me.

These are sad times.

Best of luck with it man.

 

I had a 94 that is was going to fix(hit in the rear), until I pulleed the carpet and found the floor destroyed

I might have a few pics of it, wait a few

edit

here is one

 

The rust is caused by moisture from the wet shoes of the occupants, my dads 94 is showing some signs of rust 2.

 

I think mine was worse. I can see from the pic above that the vertical section just in front of the rear seat perch is still intact. I had holes through it to the LCA mounts. Sheet metal, pop rivets, fiberglass mat and chassis saver. If it wasn't so hard to do, I'd move away from this rust belt state.

driver-side repair. note the purple patches

 

It just looks like it, I put my foot through all the rust spots you see

I didn't want to fix all that rust, so I parted out the car, the engine is in my K5 Blazer

 

I love the car. I'll keep fighting the rust to the end. One of these days something will lose strength where it is critical and I'll have to decide what to do. The car doesn't even see wet roads any more but it is still a matter of time.

 

i have decided to por15 the whole floor board. 3 hours now of wire wheeling and sanding and i almost have it all. Its only taking this long becuse im stripping all the floor board paint too. the under side of the car is rust free except for the rear end. im going to touch up the 2 spots wher the weld was bad and the ill go get the por15 after 1:30 when advance opens up. I hate these damn blue laws.

 

Doesn't surprise me too much. You should have seen the floorpans on my third gen, when I lifted the carpet, there were holes almost a foot in diameter.

 

my third gen was worse then that, the whole floor as peppers with holes, and the only thing that keep your feet from going through was the carpet, I put new floors in it

good thing I got it cheap

hate that i sold it, but hey, bigger and better things in the works

 

When I pulled the old carpet out I found some bad rust in front under the pedals, it was like that on both sides.
It was fixable but still required some grinding, bondo, and rust preventative.
Everyone with an older 4th gen should take a look under the carpet. You might be surprised.
Only place the car has had any type of corrosive problems is the floorpan.

 

I am pretty sad that I'm starting to see posts about our cars rusting. I've had plenty of older cars in my day, and once they start to rust like that (floorpans are classic), "rust management" takes up an increasing amount of time & effort...

 

I didnt get to por`15 the pan yet as the local stores dont sell it. I am going by the local body shop supply store tomorrow tho. Im going to buy enough to do the whoe floor pan and about half the way up the sides. and the trunk area. Im also going to coat the strange 12 bolt i have sitting in the garage with it.

 

That's why mine's not going to see winter weather. With a vert this'd be disastrous. My winter beater Dodge (it wasn't supposed to be but that's what it has ended up as) has quite a lot of rust, just replaced all the UJ's in the front prop after beadblasting all the rust off it, to add to the new UJs and bearings on the front axle (all rust damage). The door bottoms are going, the floorpan has (so far) surface rust in a number of places, and the first bubble has appeared on the rear wheel well. Replaced the brake lines last year. And it's just passed 25000 miles

 

damn northern living. I dont rember a time when we had road salt. if we get 2 inches of snow they shut the roads down here.