By: Pat Smith

Rust, four letters that cause more anguish and horror for car hobbyists than any other malady, Rust doesn't care what you own how much money you spent restoring it. If it's made of metal, rust will be there for the banquet.

By now most of you are in the winter storage preparation mode. Part of those plans should include some form of rust preventative protection. We're going to look at some methods and discuss them. Hopefully we'll give you a better idea of how rust acts and what to do to avoid it. This month we'll examine a rust prevention system called CounterAct. It is a device that helps your car body resist rust formation using electrostatic corrosion control.

What exactly is rust anyway? it is an electrochemical reaction where iron and oxygen combine. Since iron and oxygen have chemically opposite charges, they are continually attracted to one another and seek to combine and form rust. The faster the iron can mate with oxygen molecules, the faster your vehicle body will corrode. When rust and corrosion form on your car's body, millions of tiny corrosion cells form. These cells behave like microscopic batteries and like batteries, for a corrosion cell to continue working (rust or corrode) charge must flow from one point to another. If you interfere with the flow of the electrical charge, you interfere with the corrosion or rusting process. Sheet metal in its natural unpainted state is extremely vulnerable to rust since it exposes untreated metal to salt, rain, humidity and temperature changes. Painted sheet metal alas, is only a little more protected.

Through capacitive coupling, CounterAct electronic rust protection creates a protective negative electrostatic surface charge hat serves to provide rust protection to these hidden areas.

It just takes a tiny imperfection in the painted surface to create a rust situation. Scratches, nicks and paint chips are actually huge pockets for rust formation because the process works at the molecular level. it only takes two parts of iron and three parts of oxygen mixed with water and salt to cause serious damage. If the temperature rises the oxidation process accelerates. With unibody cars there are hundreds of hidden pockets, seams and crevices that cannot be easily protected. You can't coat it if you can't reach it so what do you do?

CounterAct uses a patented system called capacitive coupling which delivers a protective charge to metal surfaces in those crevices and hidden areas as well as the visible sheet metal. The entire car is protected. The CounterAct system uses a small (cigarette pack size) power supply. It's usually mounted on the fire wall and it puts out a relatively high voltage (about 400v) but low amperage current (measured in microamperes). The power supply is fed from the vehicle's battery drawing about as much current as a typical LCD clock. Using a capacitive coupler, CounterAct's electrostatic process  creates a negative electrostatic charge on the metals surface and polarizes the microscopic layers of electrical charges that occur along a corroding metal surface. (Remember that like the poles of a common magnet, opposites attract and like charges repel each other.)  What this does is make it very difficult  for the  opposite charges of oxygen and iron to connect as they have to battle with these polarized layers of charges. CounterAct varies the electrostatic field creating enough instability to retard oxidation. The ability of the metal and oxygen to "electrically connect" is reduces as ion mobility, the basis of the corrosion process, is reduced. The fact that CounterAct's process relies on electrostatic charges means that unlike older industrial methods of electronic corrosion protection like "impressed current cathodic protection" used on underground pipes and tanks, CounterAct can be employed on above ground and mobile corrosion problems.

How effective is it? CounterAct has gone through extensive tests and trials and the results have been remarkable. Test have been conducted on three continents by independent laboratories such as L.A.C.O.R. corrosion laboratory in Brazil, American Analytical Laboratories, Kent State University in Kent, Ohio, Queensland University of Technology in Australia, ETL Testing Laboratories in Cortland, NY. and EMC Services Pty. Ltd. in Australia. The tests go back as far as 1987 and are as recent as 1999.

The list of testimonials from satisfied users speaks for itself. They have customers working in in some of the world's harshest environments including numerous mining companies the world over.

Great Salt Lake Mineral corp. in Utah is a good example. They produce salt and potash by harvesting brine from a series of increasingly salty evaporation lagoons. (Brine is water saturated or strongly impregnated with salt and minerals.) After numerous sprays and coatings and traditional rust proofing methods proved ineffective in their super corrosive environment, they looked into CounterAct. They've been using CounterAct devices on their trucks for over a decade and have about 50 trucks with these units in service at any one time. This is one of the most severe corrosion promoting environments one can imagine, In fact Caterpillar has used this site for testing the durability of their heavy equipment. Prior to using CounterAct

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Denny Beck, a shop foreman for the D.O.T. in Winnebago County , Iowa reports that they have been using CounterAct on snow plow/salt spreaders since 1997 and that, "The trucks with the CounterAct system have far less rust and corrosion. The trucks without the system have also lost far more paint." He adds, "In my opinion this shows that the CounterAct system helps reduce the undercutting of paint around stone chips also." He further states that he  "would not hesitate in recommending them to others who wish to protect their vehicles from rust and corrosion."

 CounterAct produces an OEM system for EZ Loader Boat Trailers (North America's largest marine trailer manufacturer.) Jimmy Vassalo from EZ Loader reports, "We at EZ Loader are true believers in the CounterAct system and therefore are presently offering the system on all of our trailers." Similar testimonials exist from mining companies around the world and an assortment of local and state government entities and beach patrol services from Australia. CounterAct produces specialized anti- corrosion systems for everything from ATVs to 250 ton rock trucks as well as industrial infrastructure, steel buildings even of all things a bungee jumping tower! (one of their latest projects.)

No matter how well we pamper our Classics, rust is always a major concern. With proven results in the harshest of conditions , the CounterAct system is ideal for our everyday vehicles and hobby cars. CounterAct even produces specialty systems for 6V and positive ground vehicles as well as producing "storage systems" which operate from a wall mounted power supply. And if you are storing an entire collection of classics, CounterAct makes centrally mounted systems that can be coupled to up to 10 vehicles from one supply.

There are other pluses with CounterAct systems. They are environmentally safe with no chemicals or sprays, require no special tools for installation, have relatively simple installation and the power supply/controller can be transferred to another car, requiring only another service coupler. If you want to maximize the protection of your vehicle, you should contact CounterAct and they'll gladly give you all the details you want. The product is relatively new in Canada so an e-mail to CounterAct or a call to (1-814-745-7535) should get you all the information you need. CounterAct invites all Canadian Classics readers to stop by their exhibit at this fall's SEMA show in Las Vegas. Look for them in the mobile electronics section. CC

November 2002/Canadian Classics 63