Spider winter capabilities

[dbr]

Hello All,

Yes, I know it is a little early and I hate to have to bring it up, but I am nervous about this coming winter. I just recently moved from AZ to IL and my only vehicle is the spider. Here is where I run into my big question. Does anyone use their spider during harsh winters as a daily driver? Ok, maybe not daily but often? The reason I am asking is because I love my dear spider but if it won’t last in the winter and will rust through instantly I might have to sell it in exchange for a regular car. I want to hold on to the spider if I can but I have to drive in the winter and don’t want to see 50% of the metal disappear.

So basically does anyone use their spider in the winter, often and if they do what do they do to prepare it?

I was thinking as far as rust goes if I put an new deep undercoating, and seal any leaks in the fall I should be fine. Maybe not though. I would also put winter tires on. The only place I am stuck on is whether it will run/start in Chicago winter temps.

Any ideas?, and thanks in advance!
-Dexter

P.S. If it can’t handle winter driving it will be posted within the month on here for sale. =(

[AriK]

If you have any love for your car keep it off the wet and salty roads unless you want to see it turn to dust. You will put this car into septic shock before the poor thing has a chance to beg to bring her back to Az. Pick yourself up a used car which will be more modern and reliable for such treatment. Use the Spider as a better weather car or sell it to someone who is apt to give it more years of life. Sorry to piss in your cornflakes and i don't want to appear cocky or arrogant (because i am not) but i call it the way i see it.

[johnsje6]

I am a lifelong Illinois resident, and we usually have a few good snows each year, but it is not as bad as you might think as far as being salty. That being said - I think the winter starting of a car that old would be tricky, and if it does start, driving a rear wheel drive car is not a good idea on snow covered roads. My son traded his Firebird for a Jeep after one winter, I would agree with AriK that you could pick up a cheap used front wheel drive car for winter, but KEEP the Spider, it is too much fun in the other 8 months of the year!

[KevAndAndi]

I wouldn't even drive our Spider on a dry, early spring day when there are still remnants of salt on the road from the last snow. I guess it all comes down to "fahrvergnügen"* versus preservation. It's nice that you want to use your Spider as a daily driver, but (a) it's awfully risky to depend on it as your only form of transportation, and (b) driving it in snow and salt (or even, arguably, rain) will be detrimental to your car's long term health. If I were you, I would get my hands on a beater to use during the winter months.

The Spider simply wasn't built to last forever. No car is, of course, but there are elements of the Spider's construction that make it particularly a "Logan's Run" car (at least, in wet climates). All the Spiders' "life-clocks"** are flashing red, and we the owners-maintainers are the only things keeping them from the "Carousel" and being "renewed"***. (Folks of a certain age will understand the sci-fi reference.)

* "Driving enjoyment".
** The life-clocks have a fogged glass, naturally.
*** "Renewed" = parted out and/or crushed.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logan's_Run_(film)

[bonsaiwino]

The last time I drove my Spider in snow was during the winter of '73....did a 360 & scared the living crap out of me.

[narfire]

Had a 70 spider as a daily driver in the mid 70's in Vancouver BC.(rust ate the car in two years) Had a few instances of having to drive the car in the snow. The Wet coast snow has a heavy moisture content and when packed down turns to ice. Regardless, I found the car NOT very good in the snow even with an additional 50-60 pounds of weight over each rear wheel. The snow tires then were not as good as what is offered today, but I would park it and find a front wheel drive car like a VW Golf, Toyota ect. studded tires all around and drive with a piece of mind in the winter.
Chris

[DieselSpider]

Take a look at the thread about the need to look under your car and then you decide.

http://www.fiatspider.com/f08/viewtopic ... 14&t=30898

Me I cringe when I see photo's of cars driven in the winter in the North. You have a near to 40 year old car that has so far beaten the odds so for me getting a $1,500 Craigs List clunker to drive in the winter months would make good sense.

[Redline]

In terms of how well they go in the white fluffy stuff? No problem.



In terms or corrosion? No way. That photo above was taken in Davos, Switzerland, where they don't use any salt, ever. That's my former housemate and his car still suffered from rust problems afterwards (cosmetic more than structural, but it was still sad to see).

[joelittel]

I live a couple blocks North of Chicago and agree with the statement that the winters are not as bad as you might think.

We drive our car as much as possible but avoid the roads if there is any salt on them at all. Just guessing here but I'd say there is salt on the roads for at least two months, then sporadically for a month or two more.

Worse than the salt however are the swimming pool sized potholes that cover every road. Some are deep enough to make Jeep owners cringe. They'll kill your spider for sure.

The good news is that Chicago has a very efficient public transportation system so depending on where you live and where you need to go you may not need a car at all.

just a head's up.... don't overlook paying the wheel tax if you're parking on any public streets.

This sounds crazy to most people but I end up riding my motorcycle more than driving the FIAT during the winter months. We don't get a ton of snow so if you have good cold weather gear it isn't bad at all on the bike.

[zachmac]

Got to weigh in here. First, a Spider, well sorted, is a perfectly fine winter driving car. How do I know? Because the first two Spiders I ever saw belonged to two different roommates in the Navy in 1977 in Mass. We drove those cars every day through two of the worst New England winters on record and they both started and ran / drove fine with no issues and adequate heat (albeit with piss poor defrost and wipers!). So, yes a Spider can be a decent winter car.

BUT, I have to agree that you are also committing to basically writing the car off long term. They were driving new cars that they expected to trade / sell, not keep forever. No concern for the rust worm. Fiats were / are notorious rust buckets when exposed to harsh elements. Simply put they were NOT manufactured with rust resistance or longevity on mind, almost nothing galvanized or corrosion resistant.

BTW, IMHO there is no greater enemy to a convertible (or most cars) than undercoating. Every old car I've ever restored (and that has been many) had nice thick tarry undercoating covering up all of the rust and moisture it trapped between it and the body. This is particularly true on convertibles where the moisture has lots of paths from the top and no escape on the bottom. The first thing I always do is scrape and sand and wire brush all of it off and apply a decent coat of paint. Then you just keep it washed / clean. Undercoating just hides the evil.

I grew up in Springfield, Il and went to school at U of I and I drove some truly junk cars for all of my formative years there. Frankly a Spider would have been an improvement on most of them. That said, just about anything from the last four decades will be a vastly better daily driver.

[johndemar]

I bought my car new right out of college and drove it the first 2 winters in Pittsburgh and NW PA around the snow belt along I-80. It wasn't great in the snow, but it never stranded me either.

That said, even though it had the Rusty Jones treatment, in the 2 years before I moved to the desert, it caused rust to eventually bubble through on the rear wheel arches and a bit on the floor board below the pedals.

I agree with what the others have said, put the car away in the winter, and pick up a beater for the road salt.

[DieselSpider]

My heavy old Dodge Power Wagon W200 E20 Special was great in the winter. Plowed snow during the blizzard of 78 cleaning lots for guys with lesser trucks having to plow the total accumulation. Road salt still took it down. Just because it drives good in the snow does not make it good to drive it in the snow. A little road salt can take out a full frame vehicles frame rails in less time than you would like to think possible so how much longer will an already 40 year old unibody Fiat last? If you plan on junking it in a year or so then go for it but...

[dbr]

Hello All,

Thanks for all the responses.
So it seems that salt and rust are the real problem. By undercoating I meant using something like POR15. What if I coated the underneath with POR15, would it still rust quickly? I don't want my car to rust, that would be a huge shame. If it will rust really badly even with POR15 I will then sell it, since sadly the two car option isn't possible for me and I want the car to last.

[djape1977]

rustproofing the fiat is possible but it requires pretty much dissasembling the whole car.
i've done it only when whole car was restored and had a bare shell.
i've used cavity wax, polyurethane adheshive on all seems, and underbody protection coating
also, plastic fender liners are a must!

just to give you an idea of what products i'm talking about, without advertising particular brand

http://www.wurth.com.au/en/wurth_au/pro ... seal_1.php
http://www.wurth.co.uk/technical-chemic ... ack-1000ml
http://www.shopwurthusa.com/wurthstoref ... /p/0892082

naturally, you need to exterminate all existing rust and apply these only on clean metal or painted surfaces


few pics just to give you an idea of how extensive the work needs to be




anything short of this, and your soider will bloom in the spring, but colour will be brown

[AriK]

The Por-15 on the undercarriage would not be an easy feat to attain unless you were restoring your car on a rottisserie. Even then, you would not be able to prep the areas that you cannot access. Por-15 is useless if you cannot degrease and etch the surfaces before its application. Roadspray penetrates everywhere in the crevices and folds of every body panel such as the interior of wheel arches, inside frame rails and inner and outer rocker panels. Every factory fold in a body panel is a weakness. Add that to the fact that steel produced in the pre 80s is not the quality steel of today.
Here in Quebec we have an industry that rustproofs vehicles on a yearly basis and they spray a thin fluid in every accessible panel. Although the treatments are very effective and we can see cars with no rust post 10 years old, that doesn't account for rust that starts from the outside in, in other words, breach through a break in the paintwork. Most people are too sloppy to touch up paintwork that has been scratched, so rust and perforation eventually wins over the years.
The average car on the road in Quebec is 11 years old. By 15 years they are generally gone for one reason or another. In the 70s if we kept our car for 10 years, it was generally a rust bucket on its last legs.
If any of our Spiders were subjected to even a couple of winters, they would not have made it to where they are 30+ years later.
The best thing you can do is get a shop to professionally rustproof your car with a fluid that flows and that way it can work into every crack and crevice. A fluid that flows can even compensate for errors from a technician who accidentally missed some small spots, but your car will still be vulnerable for rust through the paintwork.
Keep these points in mind:
Your car made it this long for a reason.
You are nonetheless still subjecting your car to a death sentence by cancer.
You are not avoiding the inevitable.
It will be another Spider lost.