should i be concerned about my front leaf spring mount?

[Caner.]

i'm in the process of replacing my leaf springs and noticed this when removing the crusty bits around the mount. is this something I should be concerned about in the short term? i plan on doing a job on the whole floor this summer, just wanna know if this compromises the strength of the mount. it's the only place i can poke through, the rest of the mount and the whole floor and passenger side mount are A1, only this spot has a little issue.

and let's say I wanna fix it, can I get away using a sanding disc to clean all the rust and weld the hole shut, or I need to go from the inside?

thanks!

 

[go1lum]

You have much more rust in the area than you think. It needs to be fixed, not saying I wouldnt drive in it until then. Take a chipping hammer and start investigating.

 

[lazyxj]

Dang, that's nasty.
I would be scared to drive a vehicle with rust that bad.
Is the rest of the chassis like that?
I would want to rebuild the whole area, this isn't a minor repair job.
If the rest of the Jeep is similar, it might be time to find another, one with less rust.

 

[Caner.]

thanks for your input guys.

about the fact that there is more rust that i can see, I'm aware of that, but by poking around, this is the only spot I could get through. I'll remove the carpet to see the damages from the inside, but the rest of the floor pans and the other side mount (from the exterior at least) are in good shape.

 

[Caner.]

i took a quick video just to show what I meant. there is definitely surface rust on my floors, but overall they're in good shape. only the mount area (from the outside) looks like it's more rusted through.

the rockers are on their way out, but I think i caught the mounts in time. i'll update once I find out more going from the inside.

 

[Caner.]

another update, I just looked under the floor to make sure it was not worse than I thought. the good news is it is looking pretty good, the only thing is around the seam of the wheel well. i used a screwdriver to poke around and i think I caught it in time.

here are some pics :

 

[br1anstorm]

When examining your Jeep for rust you should adopt the "iceberg" principle. 10% is visible, 90% is hidden below the surface. Don't just assume because the paint looks sound or there is rubberised seam sealer (on the inside) or underseal (on the outside) that there is no rust lurking underneath.

My advice would be to strip back (wire-brush, disc or whatever) all visible rust, and whatever coating there is over and around it, until you can see how far the rust extends and how deep it goes. Then cut it away. Get rid of it. Replace metal if you need to, and certainly neutralise and convert what you can't remove. Otherwise, like decay in a tooth, the rust will spread......

I have had three separate campaigns to tackle rust on my 93 XJ. First - back in about 1998 - the front-passenger footwell rusted away (I suspect partly because of leaky a/c drain into the carpet-underlay) and had to be re-welded. By 2007 the corners of the floorpan under the rear seats by the rear-doors/rear wheel-arches began letting in daylight. Then in 2013 the seams between luggage-area floor and wheelarches started to part company.

Pics of my 2007 floorpan repair are here and story in this thread;
and pics of the more recent 2013 repair work are here with details in this thread.

Be ruthless. It's the only way to keep the body and chassis intact. The earlier you tackle it, the less painful the task, and the better the chance your XJ will survive.