Need some undercoating advice, To undercoat or not to undercoat. Options

[FourBlades]

What have people used for undercoating their cars? Is undercoating a necessity
or is it optional? The car will be used for occasional street/AX/DE driving.

Should I strip the old undercoating from my wheel wells? It looks pretty stable.

So far I have cleaned the underside and painted with eastwood silver rust
encapsulator.



Thanks for any advice.

John

[beech4rd]

I'm not sure that bedliner is a good idea for the floors and trunk. My car came with bedliner material ( Rhino Liner) sprayed liberally on the floors and around the trunk. I removed it all and found tiny pools of water (and the beginnings of rust) at many of the seams and especially in the low points of the floors. I think that the exterior of the car should get the underseal and the interior should be seam sealed, epoxy primed and painted. Regular cleaning will allow you to check for any possible rust. Bedliner will conceal rust. I'm not sure about the tar based floor liners that were installed on the cars at the Karmann plant either- I've restored a Mk 1 VW Scirocco that was made the same way and I discovered rust when I removed the tar liners from that car, caused, I presumed, by rail/melted snow being brought into the car on shoe soles, wetting the carpets and eventually finding it's way to the metal floor. On both the 914 and the Scirocco, most of the floor rust seems to have started inside rather than outside the cars.
Chris