Jeff,
In my 30 some years of brake work on a variety of cars, Brit and non
Brit, surface rust wont hurt a thing! The first time you apply the
brakes, the pads will "clean" the rust off. What you might be concerned
about, are grooves cut into the rotors by the pads when the steel
backing plate was allowed to contact the rotor. The friction material
will usually mate to shallow grooves fairly quickly but any deep ones
will have to go. The rotors would have to be turned if that is the case.
There is a spec. for minimum rotor thickness that all modern cars have.
However, I have never personally seen an official spec. on the TR3
rotors.
My advice at this time is to just drive it. Remember, if the car sits
for any time in high humidity, or is driven in the rain, the rotors will
have surface rust on the braking surface almost instantly!!!
Good luck,
Jim Bauder
'58 TR3 On the road this weekend!!!
Palo Alto, CA
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