Did a bit of a pre-winter wash and polish over the weekend and looking into the rear wheelarches at the back of the sills I noticed some brown staining on the silver paint. Looks like rusting may be starting there although I haven't had time to give it a good poke to see if anything pops loose.

Anyone else had rust issues here yet ? I thought it was supposed to be galvanised so no rust ?

Mine had some around the arches too, although it was a 2001 plate.

Right

Left

The rust was just infront of the mud flaps.

Edited 30 August, 201015 yr by TriggerFish

mine had a very small spot where it was starting to rust so cleaned it all up and waxoyld the area too

Mine had some in the same area. My mate ground them out and filled and painted it so its like new again.

Only took a day to =)

Rust in this area is caused by soil building up behind the arch liner, it is worth cleaning out every so often.

I had exactly the same 04 plate same place , dealer asked if I had had accident damage. Negative to that, not done under warranty though and only 2009

I will take on board previous post and watch for soil build up on my race blue 07 :-)

National

Being useless at bodywork (see my MGB nearly abandoned project for a worked example ) I'm going to get someone to have a go at it. I'll whip the liners off next weekend and clear them out - forgot about those.

Thanks for the pics - this is pretty much identical to mine just now.

I suppose I should be ready for it given the several feet of salty snow it ran in last winter.

Yeh, salt doesn't help much either. If you clean out the soil and debris in the arches and corners use a wooden implement and high pressure hose, that way you don't scratch out the cavity wax and paint. Let it dry then spray or paintbrush some cavity wax back into the corners and wheelarch lips.

I usually spend quite a bit of time spraying under the arches and where the body/liner junction is, so I was a bit annoyed when I took the front liners off and discovered a buld up of dirt against the A pillar - or front door hinge post. I have already mentioned that the build up under the centre cover is also a problem - although maybe Skoda left these plastic side under trays off (wife's car is a Polo). I have not taken the rear liners off or at least dropped them down yet, one thing though, if you are dropping these wheel arch liners, maybe buy in 4 or 6 plastic threaded clips or nut things as on both front liners, the same 2-off clips/nuts had split so were not reusable - and VW had them in stock!!

But, yes, rust, on a 2003MY Polo, not so good!

Edited 31 August, 201015 yr by rum4mo