Way O/T: Hurricane Sandy cars

[machoneman]

http://www.autoblog.com/2013/01/04/even-more-images-of-the-airport-full-of-15-000-flood-damaged-san/

An amazing pic that puts in perspective just how damaging to property the storm was.

[fe66comet]

Not to make light of it but I sure wish I could get in there for some parts all sorts of stuff in there I am sure.

[sixty9cobra]

Thats 15 minutes from my house!

[KMcCullah]

I work in a commercial/industrial laundry. My plant needed a piece of processing machinery shortly after Katrina hit. I found a used laundry equipment broker in SoCal that had this giant building full of equipment. This should have been a red flag to me, along with the really cheap prices. I found what seemed to be a smokin deal and with my bosses blessing, sight unseen, purchased a used piece of equipment. It looked really good in the pictures but in person, not so much. It was full of seaweed and sand.  So after some WTF phone calls I finally got the truth. It spent a few weeks under water, in the basement of a New Orleans hotel. By the time I got it running, I could have bought a new one. My boss is still pissed.....

[fe66comet]

There are still a lot of vehicles around here running around that were Katrina victims I always pull the carpet up and.look for sand and.also the door panels.for water damage.

[Heo]

In the 80s a ship loaded with Volvos destined
for USA sunk in the harbour in Gothenburg
A friend of me bought one of them real cheap
But in about 5 years it started to rust through
from the inside. He got big holes in the roof
and the whole body was "soft"

[fe66comet]

Saltwater does that no, good for steel that's for sure. Same with aluminum imagine what the engine and drive train, bearings look like pitted and rusty.

[Qikbbstang]

Are you kidding me,,, Steel Body parts?
         Salt water has an ability to travel very well up multistrand copper wires. Once "salted" the wire is difficult to clean and even get connections. I think with all the modern wiring, sensors etc what a mess

[fe66comet]

Truly nasty stuff eats all leaves nothing.

[Qikbbstang]

steel and iron. Ive had personal experience with salted steel and iron that needed to be passivated. The "simple" method is to dunk the parts in high purity water (De-Ionized or distilled) and let them soak for a day or so. The water being very pure is hungry and goes about pulling out the salt that's in the metal. I learned you can take salty rusty steel/iron and grind it down to "white metal" and then a later it will again rust like hell. The parts in a pure water bath will actually have small slow moving streams of rust pouring down away from the rusted sections.
               I was just daydreaming looking at all those "f#%^d" up cars thinking with pools of high purity water you could really get the salt out and make the car and or parts not ticking time bombs

[My427stang]

I would buy one in a heartbeat if I knew the honest history and the price matched the history.