I've done the electrolysis thing, I'd recommend it although it's no miracle cure. It supposedly produces hydrogen bubbles, but despite my best efforts I couldn't persuade anything to blow up. I've also tried soaking stuff in vineger, that works too but I've not found anything that leaves the metal shiney, they just loosen the rust to the point that you can rub most of it off by hand.

Yes! But it's best if you say it with the kind of accent this guy has:
or these fellas:

Look what I've been doing this afternoon:

One problem: Nitromors costs a flippin' packet, and as you can see I ran out before I finished the job.

For the other door I'd like to try a home made version. Would this work on car paint?

1/2kg household lye (caustic soda)
2-4 boxes of common cornstarch (cornflour)
10 litres of warm water
1 great big plastic bucket

Three weeks ago:

Well, 3 weeks after I dropped the rusty bits into the butt full of molasses/water, I just got them all out and gave them a light scrub with my trusty Lidl scouring pad. Amazing! The rust literally melted off, leaving pitted but very clean metal.

Probably the worst bits were the battery trays. They're now looking splendid, eg
(Note the bloom of rust already forming, just minutes after I'd finished - treat the metal immediately after cleaning!)
So now I've given them all a quick brushing of Fertan to protect them, and they're drying in the kitchen.

Conclusion: really easy and effective way to treat rust. Dump it in and forget it - the longer the better.

At last a more or less serious test with molasses !
How is the test with the two reardoors and the home made stuff progressing?

Hmm,3 weeks.Thats probably why mine wasnt as clean as yours.I cleaned mine after a week,it was ok,but not as shiney as yours .

Blinking flip. I'm reading this after a few beers and that last message from Dave is messing with my head!

Gloopy caustic soda mix is too dangerous to have at home with the kids and pets around, so I'm going to make up a batch of the evil mixture in my dad's garage - maybe tomorrow. Will keep you posted.

Right. Here is the report of my gloopy caustic soda, cornflour and water mix experiment.

The door that I worked on had been painted green. Here's a shot of it with some gloop on it. The caustic soda mix caused the green paint to literally melt off amazingly easily. However, the original car paint underneath just would not budge! Most frustrating.

Now, caustic soda is a strong alkali - so I guess I'm just going to have to find an acid-based gloop to do the job on the car paint. My dad is a retired chemist, so I'll see if I can tap him up for a recipe. Will keep you posted!

While I was waiting for the gloop to have absolutely no effect at all on the car paint, I got busy with a cutting disk. Finally plucked up courage to take the slowly rotting bonnet hinge area out. Strangely, there's a lot of localised rust behind the hinge (as you can see) but the hinge itself was remarkably sturdy. The seam underneath, where bulkhead meets hinge was not very good, though. I figured it was best to get rid of the rot now while the van's in bits, rather than patch and make good now and have to come back to the problem in a year or two.
Couple of mins later it was looking like this: Looking alright underneath. Phew!

Emboldened, I then set about the rubbish patch-up job in the back of the van. Much grinding and cutting and tugging and swearing later I was left with this: Now then - what would be the best way to sort this out?

Couldn't go and mess about on the vehicle today, so I worked on the back doors. One of them is in a bad way at top and bottom

so I cut out the rotten pieces...



Anyone know where I can get replacement pieces for these, along with a rippled section of floor for the back of the van (approx 60cm x 30cm)?

Suspect Keza's my man for this, but postage costs might be prohibitive.