pet05

Anyone live in Colorado, Washington or Idaho?

If so, how bad is the road salt during winter on our Ram Trucks??

00Dog

My buddy from Fort Collins, CO says they don't salt the roads there. I guess they use a substitute.

EDR

00Dog is correct.

Most, if not all, of the major metropolitan areas along Interstate 25 now use magnesium chloride to prevent icing, and while I'm not sure about rust issues, I know it attacks aluminum. I had a set of Weld wheels on my last truck and it really pitted the surface.

In the past, the cities/counties in the mountains used gravel, and while it didn't rust your truck it does beat the crap out of the windshield, lights and front end. When I was home in Colorado during the Christmas holiday blizzard, I found that they were using mag. chloride on some of the mountain roads as well, so they may be using it in most areas of the state now.

EDR

dbossdiesel

Dude I feel your pain! I live in NH and the salt actually creates a haze when it dries up here! I hate it. Next year my truck is going in storage and I'm getting a 2nd vehicle for a winter beater! Rust sucks! LOL

Turbobob

They salt the roads here (Utah) in the winter. I just hit the high pressure car wash after the storm clears. I have done this with all my vehicles, no rust problems here

D384D

I know some guys who spray used motor oil on the undercarriage of their (dump) trucks. Seems kind of messy but I'm willing to bet it works!!

Barry St John

My biggest problem here in NE washington is the wheels. It's 27 miles to town so anytime I go anywhere you pick up a load of road sand / de-icer. The problem is that when you get home if you wash down your rig the ice builds up in the driveway and everything turns into a skating rink. I havn't been able to keep the wheels free from corrosion at the hubcaps. I guess I'm gonna have to buy a set of wheels and just use the stock ones in the winter.

cjhauler

Yep, mag chloride here in CO. Major problems for aluminum wheels and wiring. I keep wheels waxed, then a spray of detail wax just for insurance. The main thing is to get the stuff off asap. No crimp connectors on any wiring. Weatherpac connectors or solder joint, heat shrink and coat with liquid electrical tape. Even the power utilites have trouble with this stuff. The road mist in the air coats the insulators on the power lines and allows a current path resulting in line loss.

Thundercloud

One of the local news cast did a report on the use of mag chloride and they said benefits include no rock chips from sand, prevents ice build-up and reduces accidents by 20%. The down side is RUST. It will rust your vehicle because mag chloride is a salt. They adviced washing it off your vehicle as soon as possible to prevent rust. I wish that they would not use it at all. I bet if they outlawed cell phone use while driving it would reduce accidents by 20% too . Some counties use mag chloride on the county dirt roads to eliminate dust. Our subdivision uses it on our main entrance road and I hate it. When it is wet out the mud splashes up on the side of the truck and leaves rust pits from the fine iron shavings that are found in dirt. These iron shavings will rust from the mgcl and stick to the clearcoat and makes for fun times trying to rub them out with rubbing compound. I guess I am . Sorry thanks for listening.


Dave

rjm022

http://www.carwell.com/

i have had my truck sprayed yearly since new- my truck underneath still looks new!!! unfortunately they use salt on the roads here!

EDR

I guess I can add no need for mag chloride as one of the few upsides to living in the desert!

stezlaki

We went to Colorado over Christmas when Denver got hammered with snow. Don't know exactly what they were using on the roads, but my truck had more chips on the lower portion of it at 4 months of age than my 19 year old Ford did. We were pulling an enclosed trailer which came back much rustier than it left and the aluminum trim now has some nice little erosions (full thickness in a couple places) . It took me an hour or so to get one of the padlocks open when we got back (due to corrosion).

My friend we went to visit assured me they don't use salt on the roads there and how great it is that whatever they use is not corrosive..........I'm not convinced!!

I'm somewhat sickened when I wash my truck or look closely at all the missing paint. A little too late to add fender flares, and, although I think they would help, I doubt they'll completely eliminate the problem. I guess I'll have to eventually line-x it or something????????

Anyhow, back to the original question (sorry........) the underneath portions of the $50,000+ (sticker) truck that came un-painted are definitely much rustier now than they were when I left for Colorado. The paint that is still on the truck seems to be fine.

mj007

What 'Thundercloud' said along with the others. The mag chloride (mag for short) is way worse than the salt that was used before. It's much more corrosive and gets through paint if left on. Over in Aspen where the upper-crust lives they had enough clout to force the state, county and towns to quit using it but the rest of us have to live with it. It also gives wiring problems and is death on drum-brake internals. I very rarely drive my '05 on mag-treated roads unless I have to. I've got enough old stuff around here that needs to driven once in awhile so I take one of them. The only good thing we've got going here is an enclosed truck wash with undercarriage wash setup and I did the Ram both times I had to use it in the mag. They say it reduces accidents but it will cause them too, if the temperature and snow conditions are just right. They'd save a lot more lives if they could just get some of these yo-yos to slow down from 65 and 70 on bad roads Like was said: if you get it on your rig get it off as soon as you can; it's bad news! Boy! I'm gonna have to take a break and calm down ..... this a REAL sore subject with yours truly......breathing deep......thinking good thoughts.....being happy......

pet05

Interesting notes. In the Midwest they used rock salt and that stuff was really nasty. It ate thru sheet metal really fast.

Here are the corrosion ratings:

Distilled Water = 0
Rock Salt = 100
Mag Chloride = 80

Testing conducted by the National Research Council's Strategic Highway Research Program showed that calcium chloride and sodium chloride caused lots more damage to concrete than did magnesium chloride. The sodium chloride - common rock salt - actually caused 63 times more damage than the magnesium chloride. This is a huge difference. The calcium chloride eroded 26 times more cement than the magnesium chloride. That is also a significant amount.

Magnesium chloride is also less corrosive to metal such as tin, steel and aluminum (see Author's Note at the end of this column). The reason lies in the fact that it has less chlorides available than calcium chloride and sodium chloride. Remember, it is the chloride ion that attacks metals.

In 2001, the USDA published an article entitled "Magnesium Chloride as a De-Icing Agent" that stated magnesium chloride led to "corrosion of steel and aluminum poles and pole hardware."

Also, a February 2003 Board of Montana Flathead County Commissioners minutes document called "Magnesium Chloride on Roads" on Corrosion-Doctors.org attests to magnesium chloride's corrosiveness on aluminum and steel. In a corrosion comparison done by Colorado D.O.T. and the University of Colorado, it was found that "road salt is more corrosive to the metals than mag chloride on a one time exposure." However, magnesium chloride corrodes over longer periods of time and Greg Fulton, president of the Colorado Motor Carriers Association, said it corroded aluminum on his vehicles as well as led to wiring failure.

http://www.usda.gov/rus/electric/eng...m_chloride.htm

http://www.summitdaily.com/article/2...NEWS/101030050

mj007

All that may be true but the dissolved rock salt that I'd pick up through my chain-up gloves never blistered my hands like the mag does. After the first mag season we all went to PVC or neoprene gloves and kept them on the floorboard until we got somewhere to wash them off. The plow drivers that I knew said that the CDOT regulations required them to use hazmat procedures when handling the stuff. I spent over 30 years on the road with 25 of them exclusively at night (colder, more black ice & snow, hence, more chain-up time) and all I'm going by is what I've seen. One thing that you got to take into account is that the rock salt is put on in crystalline form and the mag is already in a concentrated solution as it is applied as liquid. They probably reversed this when they did the testing. Truth be known I'd bet that some bigwig in the state government has a vested interest in the use of the mag.