Rust can take an expensive toll on vehicles, especially those in the snowbelt or in coastal areas. A rustproofing coating that's sprayed on can inhibit rust, but can fail if a chip or scratch exposes bare metal. Also, it's impossible to coat every overlapping seam, spot-welded joint, bolt and screw.

So what can you do to prevent rust on your vehicle? CounterAct Corrosion Protection Resources has developed a corrosion-protection process called "capacitive coupling," which gives a type of protection coatings don't provide. Basically, CounterAct's system delivers a small, negative electrostatic surface charge to all the commonly grounded metal surfaces of a vehicle, including crevices and hidden areas.

While CounterAct's system is not 100% effective in stopping rust, it can significantly slow the process and extend the life of any steel component. Independent laboratory testing has shown the process reduces rust and corrosion by more than 80%. CounterAct's system is not only for new vehicles, which is usually the case for coatings. It can be used on older ones, too-even those whose bodies have already started to rust.

The system has been proven successful over the past 15 years-even in cases where rust is a huge problem.

It's worked on equipment such as the brine-harvesting trucks on Utah's Great Salt Lake, snowplows in Iowa and surf-monitoring machinery on beaches in Australia. The system is already available for use on cars, light trucks, SUVs, minivans, trailers, RVs and motorcycles. CounterAct officials are waiting for the FAA to approve it for airplanes, too.

CounterAct's system is based on the principle that corrosion is an electrochemical reaction that can be controlled electronically. Iron and oxygen have chemically opposite charges and therefore seek to combine to form rust. The faster iron combines with oxygen, the faster the metal deteriorates. The metal body of a vehicle tends to have a positive electrical charge in an area where rust is occurring.

CounterAct's patented capacitive coupling process introduces a negative surface charge to the metal body instead, which polarizes the microscopic layers of electrical charges that occur along a corroding metal surface. In essence, the CounterAct system makes it very difficult for the opposite charges of iron and oxygen to connect, since they have to battle with those polarized layers of charges. The negative surface charge—and its corresponding polarized charge layers—reduces the rate at which the iron and oxygen combine, slowing down the corrosion process.

The CounterAct system has three primary components: a power supply and control module; a removable modular wiring harness; and programmed capacitive couplers.

The small-pulsed 12- or 24-volt DC-power supply delivers the required amount of current to the capacitive couplers, to generate an electrostatic field of the proper strength to reduce the ion mobility that is the basis of the corrosion process. The removable modular wiring harness makes it easy to get to the power supply and control module, so you can inspect it or transfer it to another vehicle.

The programmed capacitive couplers are attached to the protected metal surface with aircraft-grade peel-and-stick adhesive. The coupler is a small, flexible square with a thin copper plate. When charged by the power supply and control module, the coupler functions like the positive half of a capacitor, inducing a measured and specific limited range of negative electrostatic surface charge via capacitive coupling.
The metal body of the vehicle serves as the negative half of a capacitor. To use the system on a motor-home, you'll probably need eight to 10 individual couplers.

The system generates about 400 volts of electricity, but draws a current of less than 50 milliamperes. That's fewer amps than a typical digital dock, so there is no chance of electric shock. The system does interfere with computers, radios or other electronic  equipment.

Counter Acts electrostatic corrosion- control technology is in the family of traditional electronic rustproofing or corrosion-proofing methods but don't confuse its electrostatic corrosion control technology with "impressed current cathodic protection" or "anodic protection,"  which are commonly used to control corrosion on underground tanks, pipelines and other buried and submerged structures. While those techniques work
well in their environments, they cannot prevent corrosion in open
air because of lack of sufficient medium to carry the protective current to the object to be protected.

CounterAct technology actually begins where traditional electronic rustproofing methods leave off. CounterAct corrosion protection sets itself apart from these more traditional forms of electronic rustproofing because it was designed from the outset to solve open-air corrosion problems.