The thing is that you don't know how bad the rust is until you look under the paint. The smallest bubble can be a hole in the metal and the back side of the metal can be rusted so extensivly that you'll have to cut out a huge hole to remove the bad area. On the other hand, the area can be a huge bubbled up area, you knock the paint off, and it's surface. Simply you cannot tell without going under the paint.

The tough up route is a viable option. It looks just as bad with bubbles, so you're sol either way. Actually it looks worse with bubbles.

I'm yanking the w/s b/g because I have surface rust that is at the top edge of the pinchweld and extends down the vertical part of the pinchweld. Before yanking the glass, however, I'm going to get the plastic work done. That way the car's inside is fairly sealed.

Tell me about the crap that builds up under the b/g. I always hit the are with high pressure water, spending quite a lot of time making sure that the water runs crysal clear. The w/s area was super clean, but the b/g was major loaded up with crap. It was bad enough that I backed the car out and blasted it with a hose.

68Bigbird: That's not bad for a MD car. In fact that's about as clean as you can get for an unrestored car in this area. Lots of pinchwelds, front and back, were totally rusted away 25 or 30 years ago.

The bonus this MD resident has is that I have a native TX car that was transplanted in MD in 93. For a TX car, it's about average or just below average in the rust factor because the previous owners beat the dog crap out of the car, the reason it needs new quarters. I have had lots of MD car buffs look the car over, knowing where to look, and they are amazed at the virtually rust free chassis. All I can say is that if they think mine is rust free, they need to go look at some of the TX boys' cars.