Recently my wife had her vehicle checked over by our mechanic because this week she is headed on her semiannual trip to Virginia and Georgia.

Mind you, we purchased this vehicle several months ago and we were really surprised that although it was a 2007 model, it had no rust anywhere and was in excellent mechanical condition. This car came from Berlin, N.H., so that was another surprise to us.

As a side note, my latest vehicle is a 2002 Toyota Camry with nearly 170,000 miles and just like my wife’s vehicle, it has no rust on it. My car appears to have come out of Dover, N.H.

My wife had gone to a car wash in Portland that she has loved for years. If you get the works there it is a little more expensive but you did get what you pay for. An attendant at that car wash stated that he thought the brakes felt funny and so we made sure our mechanic did a thorough inspection of her vehicle. Lo and behold, the brakes were indeed bad, very bad would be the correct description. The rear calipers were stuck and clinging to the rear rotors long enough that both the rotors had to be replaced as well as the front ones. A few others things were done as well for routine maintenance and, after $500, away she went. The rust on those brake parts was horrific to say the least and it only took one winter in Maine to accomplish.

I recently gave away my Jeep Grand Cherokee, which also had severe damage due to rust and corrosion on all four sets of brakes, and that was an $800 job because even the calibers had to be replaced. If that wasn’t bad enough, the plastic gas tank had a thick metal plate underneath to protect the tank from being ruptured. I was driving on Route 202 near the South Windham Post Office when that plate fell apart because of rust. It looked bad so I called AAA to tow the car to my mechanic for repair. That metal plate was thick but the problem was that any liquid used to melt snow and ice on the roads seeped between the plate and tank. The result was the plate rusted away because there was no way to wash those materials out of that space.

I noticed a recent article that General Motors had apparently been sued because of brake lines rusting causing a failure of the braking system. Both my wife and I have also experienced that. General Motors’ winning response was that people didn’t wash their vehicles enough. My wife is faithful in keeping her car clean and yet she still was a victim of the chemicals used on our highways in Maine. Any state that uses chemicals like rock salt, salt brine, sodium chloride and/or magnesium chloride also state the problem is not the chemicals, it’s the fact that people don’t wash their vehicles often enough.

This winter is a perfect example where the snowfall was tremendous and the temperatures were cold so plenty of various chemicals were spread on roads so people could get to work while speeding to get there. There were plenty of places where roads and parking lots literally turned white. I noticed some Windham municipal parking lots actually had liquid water on them although it was cloudy and the temperature was only 10 degrees. Before one thinks I don’t use rock salt or other substances because my driveway usually dries quickly, this winter I did use some because even my driveway was covered in ice.

There was little or no rain this winter to wash all those chemicals used to treat the roads so it was impossible to avoid them on a daily basis. Some places state that they use rust inhibitors but I don’t believe they eliminate our rust problem. I think the biggest problem is the overuse of these chemicals in winter.

Lane Hiltunen of Windham believes it’s time to stop the corrosion in government.