I took my son to football practice and when i came back to my truck i notice on the quarter panel on both sides that the paint is bubbling. really pissed,its an 05.I decided to pick on of the bubbles open and no rust.but i think this happened within this week cause i washed it last week and nothing. was wondering what it will cost for repair? should i pop the bubbles and use touch up paint until i have money for repair or just leave them be? need guys!!
Cant believe it only 2005.
thanks,shawn.

 

My 05 has bubbles on just the driver side quarter as well. Believe it or not it IS rusting. Your just seeing it very early. Its a common place for Rams to rust. It needs to be fixed or it will get worse.

 

One day no bubbles, afew days later,bam bubbles but i looked alittle closer tonight and they are showing up in different places through out the quarter panels.I just can't believe a truck going for 6 yrs old is rusting so early.for the price you pay for these,you think they would last longer. any other ideas?

 

The most common cause of paint bubbles on a modern, clear-coated vehicle is insufficient waxing or using a poor quality wax. What happens is that tiny water droplets (or even vapor) seeps down between microscopic pores in the surface. Once under the paint heat causes the water to expand and creates a bubble. It is EXTREMELY common to see bubbles appear almost over-night, especially during periods of very hot/humid weather and summer rains.

So first, you need to stop it in it's tracks and make sure as-of-yet unaffected areas do not develop bubbles.
- Wash the truck with a good quality car wash
- clean all painted surfaces with a paint cleaner (special product that uses microscopic abrasives to clean BELOW the paint surface.
- Clay bar the truck to remove all surface contaminants. Use a mist cleaner/polish as a lubricant for the clay bar. This product will also work to eliminate small scratches and swirl marks.
- Apply a quality wax.

I do this entire process ONCE A YEAR, religiously. My Black '02 Grand Cherokee still looks showroom new as does my '04 Red truck despite the fact they have spent their entire lives in the deep south sun of Georgia and Florida. I wash my vehicles monthly (more often if I'm off-roading or get one of them especially dirty), finishing with a mist-on polish. I'll do a full wax every three months. But the first two steps (paint cleaner & clay bar) I reserve for that once-a-year detailing.

Now as far as repairing the existing damage:

I need to know if these are "fish eyes" (clear coat bubbles) or the paint beneath is actually bubbling, meaning if you pick one you'll see bare metal and/or rust.

Treatment is different depending on exactly what is bubbling...

 

I picked one open and peeled it off and its bare metal. i need to act fast before it gets worse.

 

Also what is clay bar? and where do i find that? and paint cleaner. any automotive store?

 

Well, it's obvious as to why you have bubbles, but yeah any auto store, wal-mart, basically any place that sells auto cleaning products and waxes.

Only a good auto paint shop can really make these areas as good as new, I have NO CLUE what they would charge. But they'll basically take the entire area down to bare metal and feather in basically the entire paint process that was done at the factory. Primer, color matched paint layers and then clear coat.

I'm going to assume you'll be tackling these bubbles individually, if it's a wide area then you'll just do the entire area instead of individual bubbles.

But you can temporarily repair the bubbles and stop the spreading by wet sanding the bubbles and a small surrounding area down to good material (in your case it sounds like bare metal). Use the finest grit you can use that will still take the paint off or you'll create scratches. Take your "touch up" paint and lightly bring the bare metal up ALMOST to level with the surrounding clear coat. Allow that to dry at least overnight, then what I like to do is take a small bottle of clear nail polish to seal the paint surface. After this dries, you can take your super fine sand paper and wet sand brush marks out of the nail polish and bring it down to the same level as the surrounding clear.

Personally, I don't know anyone else who uses clear nail polish, but I use the hell out of it. Everything from "in the boat" fishing rod guide repairs to sealing exposed nuts and bolts that are outside to prevent them from ever rusting (also it kinda acts like Lock-Tite as well)...

 

Pull the taillights out and with a flashlight look above the wheelwells bet its full of rust.

 

Hate to say it but that rust is coming from in between the innerfender well and the outer skin.there is like slits in the wheel well and salt , mud and all that jazz gets up in there and rots the panel. it looks clean from the out side (bare metal under the paint) but you get a scratch all (punch)and i bet you can put it threw the sheet metal. I have cut panels off these trucks and its all from the back side. 3rd gen dodges are notorious for rear quarter to rot out.if your from the north like i am (Michigan),go get your self a western or southern box and replace it or hang new quarter panels. if you repair it you need to SANDBLAST that area completely and fill with body filler and repaint the quarter panel it well last maybe a year and your back to square one.so after you repaint it sell it.
you can get a box pretty dam cheap if you search around.I just hung new quarters for a 97 ram they where just under a grand a piece for remanufactured.then you got to hang them.body shop to repair with body filler and repaint your box looking at 2000 to 4000 grand depending on the color and damage.I know the have these zipper shops that can paint cheap but most of the use enamel paint so do you home work. you want a base coat, clear coat,
hope all helps.

 

I didn't take the salt roads into consideration, we don't have that problem down yonder. Vehicles get it ALL from the topside down here.
But if he's down to solid metal with no rust as he states, it ain't rust through and it's from the surface.


But you need to ascertain if your first assessment is correct, that there is NO rust from the underside before repairing the bubbles. If you've got rust-through it's a whole nuther ballgame. You're looking at replacement panels or at least some cutting and bondo repair (which isn't hard, but you don't want to use your '05 to practice on)...