Welcome to the salt air effect. They sit a a lot waiting to shipped and once unloaded get another batch of salt air when they arrive. Doubt the area or container they were transported in were airtight. Ours was delivered in the same condition. You can, like we did apply Boesheild T9 to everything. Goes on as a fluid and after a couple of days it turns waxy. Was developed to preserve military aircraft on aircraft carriers have used it for decades in the marine world. It will kill the corrosion pits and stabilize the surface. By the way, my wife’s Jeep was delivered in the middle of winter, the transporter obviously was on salted roads and the frame and aluminum parts were coated much like the Emira. A couple of cans of T9 and the problem was solved
Just for context, the jeep arrived with zero paint flaws, our Emira came with factory paint flaws and transportation paint damage. The Jeep you can wash or drive through water and the AC will still work, the Emira the resistor pack and perhaps part of the wiring harness will fail. The Jeep you can park outside in all kinds of weather and the body work will not change, with the Emira you have the fatal bubble/cancer possibility on the doors and rear quarter panels developing. The seats in our jeep even after 70000 miles look like new, the Emira‘s started cutting and chaffing themselves against the plastic trim at less than 500 miles. This is my sixth Lotus- the Emira is a gorgeous car but suffers from the old “kit car” production quality of the earlier years.
At this point the “damage” is cosmetic, aluminum is actually a very reactive metal. As the prior poster mentioned ACF-50 is also another good option to neutralize this surface corrosion. I maintain, restore and fly WW II fighters and bombers for a living so I’m familiar with long term preservation of aluminum. I prefer T9 as it eventually dries into a waxy condition, but either will work.
