Hey Eric
First off man love your site I always come on here to read everything you have to say about cars and about our “loving a caring” government. I bought a 71 camaro for 2,200 bucks a year ago good what is the cheapest way to remove rust from the car?
Well, it depends!
Your Camaro is a semi-unitized design, which means it has a bolt-on front subframe that holds the engine and front suspension and a unibody rest of the car. Usually, the bolt-on subframe can be cleaned up using a sandblaster, followed by a coating of POR-15 followed by semi- gloss black paint. The front fenders and doors can either be repaired or replaced. It’s the rest of the car – the rear unibody – where you get into a more involved (and expensive) scene.
The rear quarters, trunk and leaf spring perches are areas that often have significant rust issues. The fix is to cut out the bad sections and weld in new panels. But this will require the services of a good body man, unless you are yourself a competent welder/body man!