Thinking about this a little more and while the salt and rust most likely contributed to the issue the culprit in reality may be the lack of common sense of the owner. The other day when it finally reached 40 degrees outside I got this idea to play in the snow. I was curious how well the VX would do driving up and over the rather large snowbanks bordering the driveway. It acted more like a snow plow until the tires in the opposite corners started spinning. When I was done I had snow packed in all the front orifices that I needed to clean out by hand. Perhaps this same snow bank decided to do some rearranging underneath at the same time. None the less it probably is time to switch out all the lines to the set listed above at independent4x