How Can I Fix This?

L

lutzms

New member
This is probably in the wrong thread, so if the mod could move it to the appropriate place I'd appreciate it. Basically I'm trying to fix up my mom's mini-van as best I can since she can't afford a new car, and wants to hand onto this one for atleast 3 more years.



The door was hit by something in a parking lot about 6 months ago and it looks like it broke through a "layer" on the door. I know that bondo is never the prefered method, but what else could be done? Could a fiberglass compound of sorts be used? I'm new to repairs on this scale, so maybe it's out of the scope of what I should be doing. I took it to a body shop, and they want 750 to fix it, which I thought was way out of line. Let me know if anyone thinks that really is a reasonable price. I just want to get the van in the best shape I can for as little as I can.
door.jpg
 
Has to be repainted for sure.

Go to a different body shop.

An entire door to get painted here in grand rapids michigan is on average $300-$500.
 
Actually, you can take care of that spot yourself. What I would personally do is sand down the area to the bare metal with 400 grit wet/dry sandpaper. That would get rid of the rust that is starting to develop. I would then mask off the surrounding area and use a filler primer to "fill" the spot to almost level with the rest of the surface. This may take several light coats. You would need to sand the final coat of primer to get it ready for paint. The next step would be to paint the area with the factory matched color. I've had good luck in the past in finding factory matched paint from Duplicolor and it's available at local auto parts stores like Pep Boys. Remember that several light coats is better than 1 or 2 heavy coats. It's up to you whether or not you may want to apply clear laquer after applying your base coats. After the paint has cured for several days you can take some rubbing compound and blend the repair with the sourrounding area. Granted it will not look perfect, but it should be a great improvement and would prevent further rusting.



Hope this helps :)
 
Dont do it yourslef unless you want it to look like it was done by you.



You shoudl expect to pay $250-350 per body panel. The damage is on the edge of a panel. For the shop to get it correct they will need to paint both panels. The white will need to blend onto the adjacent panel and they will clear them both completely.



If the shop doenst want to blend the adjacent panel, you may see a slight color difference between the two.
 
Dont do it yourslef unless you want it to look like it was done by you.
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It all depends on how perfect you want the repair to look. If this car is a daily driver and you just want to repair the defect and make it look better, it should be well within your ability.

I've done repairs this size and larger that are hardly detectable for very little money.



:xyxthumbs
 
Why not take an auto body class at a local junior college and learn to fix it yourself? Usually, you do get a lot of class time to work on your own vehicle.
 
If you are not planning on keeping the car for a long time then you can do it yourself. Why spend $500 bucks and then get rid of it in like a year. Save the money and do it yourself. Just make sure to clear coat the area etc.
 
The van is a daily driver with close to 160,000 miles on it, so I don't want to put much money into it if I can help it (plus since it isn't my van, the less money the bettter). Since it runs great, and isn't worth anything with the kind of mileage it has, we want to keep it for as long as possible. That being said, I'm not opposed to trying to fix it myself (if it turns our terrible, I guess it's a lesson learned). Does anyone have a suggestion of a brand of primer filler to use? I hope to spend some time the next two nights putting together how I should go about filling it, and maybe try it this weekend.
 
lutzms said:
The van is a daily driver with close to 160,000 miles on it, so I don't want to put much money into it ... isn't worth anything
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I would say, judging by your post, that the 'problem' in the picture is more of a great opportunity to learn something new! No way in heck would I spend any money to fix this in your situation. Have fun with it! :)
 
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