I've had it.....factory warranty cover paint defects?

davela72

New member
I've had it with my car, I don't even want to clean it at this point. the car is a 2006 VW Rabbit, solid black. I posted a thread before about this but didn;'t get too much of a response. I took some pictures tonight so maybe that'll give you guys a better idea of what I'm looking at.



I'm veeeeerrrryyyy particular about my car and it's finish so this is definitely not a case of neglect. The car has 13K miles on it now and wait till you see these pics. If you look very close at the car, hood esp., it looks like hundreds/thousands of tiny pits/craters/sh&t in the paint. the weird thing is that it almost looks like its under the clear.



I have a friend that is an excellent painter/bodyman so I'm going to get him to take a look at it and see what he thinks. If it turns out to be some sort of paint defect, I'm sure hoping that VW will step up and take care of this.



This is my first new car, hell I'm almost 35 now, and this hood almost looks worse than the 1990 Jetta that I had before:wall :wall :wall



Has anyone seen this type of thing before?

jumk.JPG


junk1.JPG


junk2.JPG
 
I had a similar thing happen to my fx35 when i parked at in indoor parking garage once. They were cleaning the floor and this speckled sh!t got all over the car! It clayed out, but didn't mitigate how pissed off I was! Good Luck!
 
wannafbody said:
sounds like acid rain pitting- chances are that the warranty won't cover it

That's really what worries me, and if that's the case (acid rain etching) am I screwed?
 
I wonder if it's a VW problem with their delivery process. My new 06 white GTI was rail dusted all to hell and scratched too. It took a lot of work to clean it up.
 
Nimble, please give me some tips, what were your processes for correcting? You know though the more I think about this, i think it is acid rain etching. VW does have a TSB out for industrail faalout and they're using the FK decontamination system, it looks like it might work for acid rain etching as well?
 
I have seen the same thing before on a newer GTI. It looked like a chemical pop in the clear, but I did not really inspect it. I would contact VW just to see what the problem is or was. Has it always been like that or did it just start to appear?
 
A decontamination system can help prevent damage to your paint, but it can't correct damage after it's happened.



It could be acid rain etching, however your description that some of it looks like it's under the surface of the clear indicates it may be something else, such as solvent pop. That usually only happens with inferior quality repaints, which are possible even on a new car if they're damage in transit. Your friend who is experienced and can inspect it in person is in the best position to diagnose the problem. At any rate, if any of the damage actually is under the surface, that would indicate to me that it should be a warranty claim regardless of what the actual problem is. Once you figure out what it is, then you need to be absolutely positive that it's fixed correctly.
 
I have a Audi and the paint warranty is sorta tough to get approval on. One has to show that the probelms are with either the paint or it's application at the factory.



They look to see if the defect's/marring is coming from the panel side (in/under the paint) or externally.



If it were solvent pop it would've been apparent when you got the car, was it?



Why not take it back to the dealership and have the service manager take a look?



MorBiD
 
Depending on how recently any damage had been repaired (presuming whether that happened at all) the solvent pop (presuming whether that's what it is) may not have shown up for weeks, especially to the extent that appears in the pictures. I learned that from sad experience last year, which thankfully has been repaired now.
 
Well, here's alittle update. The VW rep was in today, I work at a VW dealer BTW, and I asked him to take a look at my car. He was eyeing up for a bit and said he thought it should buff out, I'm thinking otherwise but ok. He said he wanted me to check with a local reputable detailing shop and see if it is possible to correct the paint. If the paint is able to be corrected, he said he would goodwill the cost for me. I'm crossing my fingers but I have to find someone to look at it now.
 
Did he say what he thought the problem was? If you're going to try a detailer, try to find an Autopian in your area. There's a lot of hacks out there. If you ask me, it sounds like it's going to take wet-sanding at the least, from what I can see of the damage. Make sure whoever does this has a paint depth gauge.
 
I have the same car and I've noticed the same situation. Unfortunately my car was rear ended and the 1/4 has been replaced. The shop did a good job and painted the entire rear of the car, both quarters, and the entire roof (no body lines on the car so this was done to ensure a good match). The new paint does not have the marks the original paint had, I looked at it the other day under halogens(and found a bunch of tracers and sanding marks :down )



I can't believe your car after 13k is holding on to the paint, my front end is so chipped and blasted from the winter I couldn't even tell you if the dots were there or not so with the repaint and the front end damage I don't think I'll be able to help with any recourse from VW.



I don't think the paint should be fragile though. My 1997 jetta had 4 times the miles and about 7 chips.
 
My 05 Civic has a similiar problem. At first I was placing blame on improper application of the dealer sealant that I got rooked into buying, but as it turns out it was a defect in the factory paint job (I got a big azz run around blaming everyone else before they even considered it a paint defect) . Per the GM, what must have happened was acid rain etched in the paint BEFORE the clear was applied. To tell you the truth I have absolutely not idea whether this is correct, but he did offer to repaint the whole car for free. I double checked with Honda of America and they confirmed that the responsibility for any corrections would be at the dealer level. I opted not to have the car repainted as I was concerned about the cleanliness of his paint rooms and getting bunches of dust in the paint.
 
I went to a local auto body supply place today and a couple of the guys went out to take a look. unfortunately it was cloudy out so the spots didn't show up nearly as much as they normally do. He did break out some 3000 grit paper for me to check out, I though 2000 was smooth. He said that would do the trick but he was worried that once it was buffed back out that it would swirled all to hell. I'm half tempted to say "screw it" and leave it, I wish there were some good detailers around here, ughhhhhh
 
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