Suppose, hypothetically, that you had been passing a very scruffy old Datsun pickup truck parked in one of those soon-to-be developed areas where parking restrictions are not enforced, which tend to collect old and possibly abandoned vehicles.
Suppose you rather liked those trucks and were saddened to see this one so neglected.
Suppose further that you had some home made rust inhibitor (hypothetically, a mix of diesel, hydraulic and sunflower oil) left over from treating your own car.
Suppose on the third passing, late at night, you cracked and skooshed some over the bonnet and down the grille in front of the windscreen (a rot trap on these).
If you got caught (video?) what might they charge you with? Its clearly an invasion of privacy, but getting a malicious damage charge to stick might be difficult.
OTOH a Taiwanese court is going to be baffled by the idea of preventative maintenance so it might be the only option.
If it’s that neglected, I doubt the owner will even know or care. I can’t lie, it’s weird you’d do that. Probably best in the future not to go messing with other peoples’ property unless they give you explicit permission (even if what you’re doing is a “service” in your opinion… they might not share that opinion).
I don’t think there will be consequences as the truck sounds like it’s semi-abandoned. It’s just not your prerogative and you shouldn’t tempt fate by risking trouble for something so trifling. Yes, some people get pissed off at Good Samaritans, even “Rust Fairies.” Anyway, that’s all I’ll say. Good luck, but I’d be surprised if you needed it.
If it has a license plate it cannot be “abandoned”. You gotta contact the person who owns the vehicle and ask if you can have it or offer to buy it from him, and then have the registration transferred.
Another thing you can do is call 1999 and report it as abandoned, and then they will come and put a notice of abandoned vehicle on it, and if no one does anything for x number of days (it says it on the notice) they tow it away and scrap it.
I think this is one of those only you situations. Only you know if ameliorating the rusting process on a random parked vehicle is worth the chance of exposing yourself to legal penalties and/or incurring the wrath of some xenophobic or rust-loving owner.
I don’t know. I’d be pretty annoyed if someone was messing with my property, even if they thought they were performing a service. If there’s no damage, I don’t think I’d press charges… but it’s still an invasion of privacy at the very least.
It depends. If you keep removing rust everyday without doing anything to stop it from rusting like painting them, eventually you will wear a hole through the panel, and that would be damage.
If you want to be a rust fairy ask the owner for permission. Otherwise such unsolicited work is still vandalism if the guy decides to press charges.
The air here is very good at converting things to rust
Edit: (so I’m not just being an arse) The last time I needed to paint some heavily corroded iron window bars, I just went to the local Rainbow paint shop and got a small tin of single coat paint.
It was the equivalent of Hammerite back in the UK but had a smooth finish, its lasted a good few years. They had a 2 step and 3 step process also so I’m sure they will have what your looking for.
Rust converters consist of a phosphoric blend made to convert iron oxide into ferric phosphate by chemically penetrating the existing rust. Unlike paint which covers a surface, a phosphate coating is part of the surface itself and most rust converters also can work as a paint primer.
