So, I’ve been doing an experiment….
I stumbled across Bilt Hamber laboratories a couple years when I was overhauling my bug, I used their rust converter/inhibitor product called Hydrate 80 and was very happy with the finish it leaves, it cures as a tough black primer. However as I’m sure we’re all aware these kinda things can often be branded as snake oil so I decided to do a test as I’m currently addressing a rusty inner sill and re finishing the entire underside of my bus with hydrate 80 before using stone chip as a top coat
Obviously left is raw sheet metal and right is with 1 coat of hydrate 80. They’ve both been sitting under a hedge on mud across the yard from my workshop for 3 weeks. The edge of the coated piece got a bit of orange but the BH instructions say apply the first coat vertically wait 24hrs then apply another horizontally. This is just 1 quickly applied coat held between my finger & thumb
Naturally these results don’t mean I’ll be content driving my bus in the middle of January when the roads are marinated with salt but it’s nice to know there is a product that actually does as advertised (so far). I shall continue to leave the metal under the hedge and periodically check on how it’s holding up but so far I’m pretty impressed