Need advice on repaint in body shop

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velobard

New member
Tomorrow my car goes in for some bodywork and they'll be repainting a few panels; the rear bumper cover and trunk (minor accident) and the hood (my request to deal with rock chips). In conversations with the owner of the shop, I'm not sure if I'd rather have them paint just the panels or spray the panels and blend onto the fenders to deal with any possible mismatch of color. If they do just the panels, they can take the bumper cover, hood, and trunk lid into the shop and totally avoid overspray on the rest of the car, but there's greater risk of seeing the difference in paint color due to slight mismatch on color.



The shop owner also said that with Chrysler paint the color ordered from the paint code has a reputation for being a little off, which is what I found. Last week they sprayed a sample to compare the paint they ordered in to my car. It was very close, but my paint (dark garnet red metallic) appeared to have a touch more red in it and the sample appeared a bit muted. Since my rear bumper is messed up anyway, we cut off a piece of painted plastic from there and left it at the shop for them to compare when they tweak the paint color.



So, as I said I'm wondering if it's better to do just the panel or to blend. If I opt for blending, I'm obviously going to have to do some claying for overspray. They could spray the entire hood and blend into the top of the fenders. Also, if there is a blended line, what's that going to look like if I clay it to get rid of overspray? Tomorrow's the big day and I'd appreciate some guidance!



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I'd a) go with what the painter wants to do, b) be inclined towards blending on metal panels and painting separately on plastic panels like the bumper covers (which never seem to match perfectly anyhow).



I'd certainly have the bumper cover painted off the car, they just seem to turn out better that way for a number of reasons.



I had the S8 done both ways following the deer incident- blended on the driver's side and not blended between the new hood and the (original) passenger side front fender. Now it's a few years later and the blended side doesn't show the repair as much as the unblended one. Having one panel one way and an immediately adjacent panel slightly different shows, even when the difference is very minor and the differences seem much more pronounced over time (note that this car is really pampered so IMO it's a pretty safe test case). There are issues with blending too (including the potential for overspray), but overall that side looks better to me. Over the years I've generally been happier with blended repairs, even though I have a knee-jerk aversion to the whole idea. But of course YMMV and there are a zillion little variables....



Best of luck, hope it all turns out great.
 
So you're saying there shouldn't be any issues with claying the blended line? I've been wondering if the clay would take off bits of the blending and make it look cr@ppy.



This is a small shop in the country and the owner is an old family friend. He used to help my uncle get gas ration stamps in WW2, so yeah, I mean OLD, lol. The guy actually doing the spraying looks like it's going to be his assistant, who is supposed to do quality work and is recommending blending.
 
I'd suggest you spend a little quality time with the painter to get comfortable with the process he will use. First of all, overspray shouldn't be a concern - whatever areas are not being refinished should be completely masked off. Now, on to your concern about a line where the blend occurs. Your car, like most modern cars, has a two-stage paint process, where a base coat is applied first (which provides all of the color) and a clear coat is then applied over the base coat. When the painter "blends" the color, he sprays the base (color) coat onto a portion of the adjacent panel, making the application lighter and lighter as he moves away from the repaired area (or new panel). This fools the eye into thinking the color is a perfect match, even if it isn't. Typically, the entire panel that was blended (a fender, for example) is then clear coated. Because the entire panel is cleared, there is no physical "line" where the new paint ends. There are exceptions (for example, a rear quarter panel where there is no place to stop unless you clear the entire roof, etc.), but in those cases there are ways to "melt" the new clear coat into the existing finish so there is no noticeable line. Hope this helps!
 
Even in areas where it was "melted", I've never had any problems. I've done some pretty aggressive correction in those areas (including with the rotary) and it worked out fine, though a little common sense *is* called for.
 
I spoke with the body shop this morning. Apparently my car has been totally repainted before. When I bought it the Carfax said it had had left side body damage, but apparently they painted the whole car. They said the paint job was done fairly well,but the shop owner says the paint he ordered in matches the original paint, but is just a touch off from the stuff put on later. I can't afford a full repaint, so he's proceeding as planned and working to tweak the tint to match as well as possible. He knows I'm picky and he's been doing body work for literally over 50 years, but it's still nerve-wracking waiting to see how it's gonna come out. :nervous2:



This shop swears by finishing their work with an aeresol spray product called "Waterless Wash". I'm not sure, but I think this product might have some kind of wax or sealant in it. When I get the car back, I'll probably go over the car with a nice, gentle wash with Dawn with a wool mitt to make sure it's stripped down and clean. Any other recommendations?
 
Well, the complete repaint isn't good news, but I'd expect them to come very close to matching it.



I wouldn't bother with a Dawn wash, just a stronger-than-normal mix of regular shampoo will be fine IMO. Not familiar with "Waterless Wash" so I dunno if you'd even need to bother doing anything special..
 
I'm going to try to get more information on the Waterless Wash to confirm whether or not it has wax and is truly "body shop safe". My only purpose in thinking of using Dawn was in case I needed to remove any wax from this product. If I find out it's nothing to worry about, I'll just do my best to follow decent 'new paint protocol'. To be honest, I'll have to do some more searching on what products and such are recommended. Glaze? QD? Basically, I'll be digging for what products to use and how soon to use them.
 
velobard said:
My only purpose in thinking of using Dawn was in case I needed to remove any wax from this product.. Glaze? QD? Basically, I'll be digging for what products to use and how soon to use them.
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Products like that which *do* deposit wax don't leave much, so it'd clean off easily enough.



I can't imagine needing a QD except for bird bombs. I'd get some Meg's #34, which can be handy stuff to have around anyhow. Also along those lines, I'd get a bottle of their #5 New Car Glaze, a nonabrasive glaze that's perfect for curing paint. I recommend this over the other products that're fresh-paint safe in part because it's as user-friendly as such products get. Many people like #80, but it contains abrasives that a) you might not need, and b) might not *want* (it was once too harsh for some fresh paint I tried it on and others occasionally find it too harsh for *cured* paint too).
 
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