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Fluid Film?
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I'm moving back up east in May. They salt the roads in the winter when it snows, and after all the time and money I've put into restoring my M38A1, the last thing I want is for it to suffer the early corrosion most north eastern vehicles suffer from! I know people in, say, Minnesota, use a mix of paraffin and old engine oil to undercoat their vehicles, which is extremely environmentally unfriendly, not to mention a grimy mess! I was thinking of applying this stuff instead, and maybe even doing a bit of undercoating with a rubberized sealant as well. Any opinions?

Most restorers do not drive their restored vehicles on salt covered roads.

Vehicle undercoating has been around over 50 years. Any process you use is only as good as the preparation under it. Any modern commercial undercaoting product will work when applied to a clean freshly painted bottom side IAW the undercoat manufacturer's instructions. Applying any undercoat to an unprepared used finish surface is a waste of time.

My jeep doesn't have a heater, so no driving in the REALLY cold weather. I guess that keeps me off the salted roads!

In Seattle, don't they use sand on the road when it snows?
In Philly, where I am moving to, they usually only use salt a couple of times a year. The problem is, once they've used it, it stays on the road for months afterwards. I don't want a vehicle that is just a trailer queen. I might have put a decent amount of money into this, but it's not like I have huge cash reserves to spare and can afford to just pay to garage one vehicle while I buy another one to drive around all winter.

The salt does not stay on the roads for months it washes off after some rain.

I was born and raised in Maine... my father worked for the city as a heavy equipment operator . Almost all of the roads in the norhteast get a regular coating of sand and salt, in addition to a chemical ice melter when the temps get really low; on them to assist in keeping them open in the winter.

This salt mix usually washes away with the spring rains and is gone after that... any vehicle you drive in this portion of the country will have the possibility of corrosion due to the salt... newer cars do not get it as much due to the better methods of priming and painting used today. However growing up vehicles were usually rusted out in a couple of years...

So your best bet will be spend your time and money on doing a really good job of prepping and priming the body, maybe a couple of coats of good primer, then the same with the final coat for paint... when driving in this weather then wash the vehicle regularly paying close attention to the underside and in the case of a jeep the inside as well.

I now live in Oklahoma and the roads here still get the regular coating of salt... so IF I take my M-38CDN out in it it gets a good washing inside and out after a run... I try to do this on a good sunny day and give the jeep time to dry out before storing it back in the garage...

This is one of the prices to pay when living in this type of climate... My opinion...

Hope this helps...

Mag water or calcium chloride works to disolve your vehicle. It's like sodium chloride or salt. Any point that it stays in or enters will eventually get you. Undercoating for chip protection is good, but really what you need to do is if you drive in the wet, wash off your Jeep when you get home or put it away to remove the mag water crap. The English marketed some stuff called waxol which coats sensitive areas like the insides of rocker panels to repel water and salt. I own a 2000 TJ Wrangler and am amazed at how well it was sealed up at the factory against corrosion. Leave your baby home during bad road conditions and get a modern Jeep for that. Your old Jeep has too many places of overlapped panels. You could stay west and avoid it too!!! John

I have a junk M38A1 parts jeep (very early) from you guessed it. Pennsylvania! I should post pictures of it as it looks like it was eaten alive by rust.

OK, thats from the old Penn Dot that used rock salt and slag/ash for roads. That was a long time ago.

In recent years the corroder of choice has been (I think) a chloride solution sprayed onto the roadways in advance of snow or freezing rain. It works great at keeping the roads clear at around 32 degrees. Once the snow falls its back to the rock salt/sand mix. I have not seen slag/ash used for a long time in the winter. All the steel mills are gone...

Avoid the salt sprayed roads if possible in PA but a power washer will do a great job of getting most of it off.

By the way you can get Waxoyl from Rovers North in Vermont.

Waxoyl?
Apparently, the USMC version of the M38A1 had an undercoating (to deal with the corrosive weather in Korea and other places). This was apparently applied at the base once the vehicle arrived.

In the late 50's and 60's do it yourself spray on undercoatings flooded the market. Any 5 year old kid could undercoat his dad's car. 5 to 10 years later the result of applying any undercoat after the car had been operated a while proved fruitless.

Just go back to the top of this post and reread the posts that point out the importance of a clean dry well prepared surface is an absolute necessity.

The Marines M38A1's contracted in the 60's from Kaiser were undercoated when they arrived at the main east or west coast USMC Depots before they were distributed to their new owning units. The A1's the Marines picked up through the DRMO's when the Army made the big switch to the M151 were processed through those same depots and rebuilt, repainted and undercoated there.

So, if I wanted to undercoat it, my only real choice would be to pull the body tub, and maybe sandblast it? After everything else I've done so far, I think I'll be a bit to broke to do that.