Treating mild rust on solid parts

[D13]

I live in Michigan, where the water is salt free because we put it all on the roads. I just picked up some Texas sheet metal for my square body. The paint is sound but faded, one is a Starcraft conversion part with lots of paint and vinyl, etc. These parts are super solid but do have some minimal areas of surface rust. Long term use is K20 for dirt road and snow plowing work, a nice truck but not a show truck by any means.

Washing, scuffing, epoxy priming, single stage top coat (on the inside), and rustproofing / cavity waxing, all are good to go. Question is, how to treat the rust? Particularly on the fenders, it's difficult to get behind the reinforcements to do anything mechanical, and here in MI, a spot turns into a hole very quickly. Perhaps a mild acid dip (used oxalic acid on some projects with good results) followed by neutralizing and then priming? Hate to toally strip them as the current paint is well adhered.

[Getter-Done]

You could try something like this from Eastwood in the link below.
I have bought some but I am not to the point in my project that I can use it.

Link:https://www.eastwood.com/eastwood-in...z-aerosol.html







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[mongocanfly]

If it's small spots that con ernie you and cant easily get to, you could sand blast it in spots...one of the small home garage style sandblasters will work on stuff like that...but any rust needs to be removed to bare metal and epoxy primer only on the bare metal..

[nsb29]

They make the spot blasters that’s more like a paint gun it holds the sand write in a cup on the gun years ago a guy had one that had a cup about 3 inches in diameter with a rubber seal you put it up against an area you want to clean and pull the trigger the sand was held in a cloth bag and made very little mess if you are old enough to remember the spark plug cleaners that was how this worked But be extra careful sandblasting around supports as the over spray has tendency to warp the sheet metal adjacent