Ziebart - worth it?

Have an appointment to get my xj undercoated and rust proofed on Monday. Is it worth having it done or should I just go straight to have it rhino lined underneath? Any prep work I should do?

Thanks guys.

How much is the Ziebart?

$200 for the undercarriage and $100 for the rust proofing

No way. I'd do that on my own. That way you know its been done correctly, by you. I'd imagine $300 would get you enough material to do inside and underneath.

It is a quality product and carries a guarantee. The problem with doing it yourself is to get everything clean and the rust stabilized. Its a lot more than just spraying some junk on the metal.

I had a 1970 car that had been Ziebarted right out of the factory. Not a spot of rust on it 35 years later when i owned it. For that cheap it seems like a good idea!

If youre going to do it yourself, youre in for a lot of work to do it right. We did mine with 1 kit of Raptor Liner. We pulled EVERYTHING off.

My 92 Ramcharger was ziebarted on the under side and rust proofed (had little holes drilled all over with ziebart plugs in them......




I think they mixed the "rust proof" solution with a salt water wash on the inside?:twak:

Just saying haha. Tho it was owned by some fat rednecks before me so who knows what they did to it.

I keep getting a lot of mixed reviews. I have a gallon of POR 15 here which I am hearing is incredible rust proofing paint and I was also thinking of getting a kit of herculiner to go over that. Debating doing it by myself at the moment.

As much as I'd like to get it done, the guy who I talked to on the phone didn't seem to knowledgeable on what he was talking about. I've read up on how it is supposed to be prepped and when I asked him he said yeah, we wash it and sand down a little of the rust spots, but that's about it. It just didn't seem to convincing to me that they were going to do a good job, so I cancelled the appointment.

I know this is going to be a project and a half, but I am thinking if I split the project up into doing the rear and the front two sides that it may be a bit easier on me and I could take my time a bit more.

Hmmmm........................

I have used POR-15 on all my bumpers and rails as a base coat then spray over with rustoleum us it's not uv resistant. It does a great job and really doesn't need any prep over rust. It does however have to go on bare metal and they have a metal etcher you should use. I tried it on the bottom of the jeep and it hasn't held up very well in the high heat areas near the exhaust tranny and tcase. However I didn't sand to bear metal in those spots because I was 20 years old and in a hurry and everything was still in the jeep. I bet of I could have roughed up the metal it would have worked fine but I dont know for sure. They do have some high heat stuff.

I plan on using monstaliner for the interior. Don't know if it works for the ext as well.

I have used POR-15 on all my bumpers and rails as a base coat then spray over with rustoleum us it's not uv resistant. It does a great job and really doesn't need any prep over rust. It does however have to go on bare metal and they have a metal etcher you should use. I tried it on the bottom of the jeep and it hasn't held up very well in the high heat areas near the exhaust tranny and tcase. However I didn't sand to bear metal in those spots because I was 20 years old and in a hurry and everything was still in the jeep. I bet of I could have roughed up the metal it would have worked fine but I dont know for sure. They do have some high heat stuff.

I plan on using monstaliner for the interior. Don't know if it works for the exterior as well.

I have had it done to a Comanche before. Not worth it in my opinion. They made a mess and didn't properly prep the underside. The factory undercoating was peeling off and they sprayed right over it. Needless to say, the new undercoating chipped off with the old stuff and was easily scratched off elsewhere on the cab.

I can't think of the name right now but a LineX dealer in Indy used a different product on my 11 Ram 1500 and it is a clear product but is guaranteed for life on the vehicle (at least new vehicles)

bmyohn said:

I have had it done to a Comanche before. Not worth it in my opinion. They made a mess and didn't properly prep the underside. The factory undercoating was peeling off and they sprayed right over it. Needless to say, the new undercoating chipped off with the old stuff and was easily scratched off elsewhere on the cab.

I can't think of the name right now but a LineX dealer in Indy used a different product on my 11 Ram 1500 and it is a clear product but is guaranteed for life on the vehicle (at least new vehicles)

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This is what I meant by do it yourself. I highly doubt they're going to remove everything underneath. In addition, it will never be as good as you can do by yourself. Just my opinion. It's cheaper for me to have my oil changed by WalMart, but do I? Nope. Because the people there could care less. So so analogy, take it or leave it.

redneck said:

If youre going to do it yourself, youre in for a lot of work to do it right. We did mine with 1 kit of Raptor Liner. We pulled EVERYTHING off.

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If you're going to do it, do it the right way. Not saying your need this car rotisserie, but he's def. got the right idea. That looks amazing!!

Re: Ziebart - worth it? Maybe better off with Q*bert

Pretty serious mixed reviews. Like most other applications sounds like prep is everything.

You might be better off with Q*bert than Ziebert

Zebart does a super job but to maintain its warranty, the vehicle must be "touched up" every year and signed off by the authorized agent. I purchased my '00 brand new and had it Ziebarted immediately. I maintained it for 10 years.

The first 3 years the original center did a super job of doing a recoat, then went out of business and I had to go to a different center.

The twits at the new center sprayed that black crap all over my axles and shocks that had never been sprayed before. I made them clean the stuff off. They really whinned about it, but I told them why would you recoat something that hadn't been coated before. Their story, Ziebart corp told them to. They told me to remind them about not spraying the axle and shocks the following year. The following year I reminded them and they did a fair job but had lots of over spray. They went out of business.

The following 5 years I took it to another location, made sure they new about not spraying the axles, or for that matter, nothing below the frame rail. The did that pretty well but the amount of recoat they applied, I could have done with a paint brush. Their comment, it didn't need any more. So why was I paying $165 for a recoat, up $85 from what I paid before. When they started pushing $200 for a half assed spray just to keep my warranty valid, I quit going.

I now get two oil sprays a year that do better than the Ziebart sprays.

Besides, with the body getting as mangled as it has been, I think it would be hard to uphold the warranty. Even though it's hard to tell from a distance.

Looks like I'll probably be doing it myself. Probably break it up into sections to make it easier since I do not have a place nor the time to take every component off of the frame rather than just sections at a time.

Anybody have any advice on using/prepping for POR-15? Do you think Herculiner would adhere to POR-15 really well - I've heard it acts as a primer.

Get it down to bare metal and either etch it with their product or scuff it up and roll or spray. As long as you put Herculiner on while the POR is tacky it should adhere really well.

On my bumpers there are time when I have chipped the rustoleum off the POR is still underneath, no bare metal.

I put POR15 on my floors(surface rust) and used their cleaner and prepp solvent and it works great, about 90% of any good paint holding up is in the prep job.