legacycentral bbs

I picked up my Touring Wagon in December as a winter driver. The body looked clean when I bought the car but after a few weeks the rust started to show behind the front wheel wells.

With the weather warming now I finally took the time pull the wheels off and peel back the fender liner.



Yes, that's about four inches of packed, moist dirt and decomposing leaves. The only problem with scooping it out was that plenty of rusty flakes came out with it. Looks like I'm in the market for a Pure White passenger fender.



The picture doesn't do it justice. Its at least four cups-worth of mud. I know this is a really common issue but I was still surprised to find so much gunk packed in back there.

I was heading out for lunch or somesuch a month or so ago, and noticed some stuff there, and started poking at it. I don't think I got as much as you did, but there was plenty of material in each side of the car. Now that I can expect the weather to be nice, I think this weekend I'll put the hose back on the faucet and wash it out.

I'm just wondering about the rear wheel wells...

SC

Wash your car in the self-wash stations and blast the hose between the liners and lower fender until you see the water run clear. It's the only way I know to avoid the issue. Ten years on new fenders (which I undercoated before installing) and I just removed them and they still look pretty good.

Yeah, I got about a 5 inch pile of dirt/road dust out of mine when I was doing the ball joint.

Good call on the power sprayer, though with how thick/built up this was I think the only way to get it all out was just to scoop it.

Yeah, at that point, you have start from the beginning. The best thing is that Subaru did a good job on rust prevention and the sill area behind the fenders will probably be decent. I say probably because these cars are old now, but mine just had surface rust, though that was also 1998 and I treated it and painted it then.

Welcome to the 1st Generation Subaru Legacy. You collect stuff in your fenders, hence used fenders being nonexistent. If you think a power sprayer or hose will take care of it, get real. Spend an hour to pull a few bolts to really clean it out.

Been there twice, so far...
The bright spot in all this is, it's only the fenders that rust... the body almost never rots.

lol, had more than that in mine, in all 4 fenders too

I have the same exact problem, and pretty soon I will have to replace both front fenders...let me ask this question because I do not know where the outlet is, but does this have anything to do with the sunroof drains?

No. My car didn't come with a sunroof and the one I installed later is a manual one, which has no drains, and I had the same problem. It's just that the crap that gets kicked up by the tires gets past the fender liner and stays at the bottom of the fenders.