Rock chip repair??
 

My car is a 2000 - ocean blue. It has 76k miles on it. Never had a clear bra or any type of "protectant" on the front of the car. the paint job on the rear, the sides, the front fenders, the doors - is all GREAT. with a good clay bar job and wax - my "ten year old" paint job shines and is beautiful.

my hood and bumper cover, however, that's another story. :rolleyes:

I would estimate there are a good 20 or so nice sized rock chips..nothing "huge", but there are enough of them that it looks like little white specs all over teh hood. most of them concentrated toward the front of it. many are pin prick sized, a handful are maybe 1mm at most..maybe not even that big...basically, they are all really really small...but not so small that you cna't see them.

my car is ocean blue - a nice dark color - so the white chips stand out against the deep dark paint.

what do you recommend to fix this? I know I could get the front end repainted - but I would assume i"m looking at easily $1000 for a good quality job.

I'm thinking of trying some form of touch up paint - but wanted to get a consensus here if there are any paint repair systems, touch up paint, etc that work well for this and are there any special techniques to try and get the finish smooth -and not globby. I don't want "puddles" of paint making the finish look uneven.

if I could just fill the holes with a small amount of paint - so that the white is gone - it would likely look 100x better - even if the color match was not perfect...

i don't want to blow at on of money for new paint, if I can get a big improvement with just cheap touch up aint. paintscratch had a paint pen - anyone try that?

i'm open to suggestions.

are there professional services that do rock chip repair, essentially usign touch up type products but they just do it very well and would get a better result than me for a reaonable price?

i did a quick google search and found the drcolorchip website. the photos/testimonials are compelling - but who knows if it's REALLY that good or if that stuff is just hype/marketing.

anyone try their product? they claim it's "not" just regular touch up paint... check the site. the results they obtain in their before/after photos are really good.

The trick with touch up paint is never to use the brush that comes with the bottle. Something small like a toothpick will work much better - much better control over the amount of paint.

I used Dr. ColorChip http://www.drcolorchip.com/ with fairly good results - but don't expect miracles

Paint Chip repair
 

I own a black 2003 Box and it has 55k on it. I have been in your position before and when the chip density is as you describe, touch up paint generally does not cut it because all you tend to see is a bunch of blobs (even with some wet sanding). I would go to 3 of the better body shops in your area and get quotes to shoot the hood and bumper.

I live in MN and I was able to get an excellent job done for $800 and they used the quarters as a "let down" panel where they blended the paint into the fenders so your eye is not drawn to the paint line. Hope that made sense.

If you're planning to keep the car for a few years, (to me) the 8 bills is totally worth it.....as you car is now more or less perfect.

Good luck,

MRC

2008 Silver Box S
2003 Black Box (non-"S")
2005 Audi TT Roadster Chipped

FWIW, clean the wax out of them and I bet you won't see them as much.
The white you're seeing is dried wax I bet.

Jim

I touch up stone chips every 2 years or so... old school method.

Tape off the areas to paint, use Porsche matched touch up paint, thin it down a little, apply with toothpick, let dry 2 days, wet sand with superfine paper, buff with rag and rubbing compound, polish. It does not look new but it does look way better. Just requires a little patience and elbow grease. If you don't like the results have it re-sprayed.

My bumper is 10 years old, and has the same problems in addition to a few big scratches, and some dull spots (the previous owner left the bra on in the rain).
I've tried Quixx, TurtleWax polishing compound, Meguiar's Ultimate Compound. None of these completely got rid of any of anything. So then I tried touch up paint, which works, but is still visible.

I am probably going to get it repainted this summer. I just got a quote today of about $500 to remove the bumper and get new paint baked on.
Ultimately, I think it depends on how bad the damage is, and how perfect you want the bumper and hood to be. :cheers:

I am going to try the following thigns:

1) see if I can clean out wax from the chips to see if that takes away the "white" which makes them highly visible

2) if that doesn't work, then try touch up paint or dr. paint chp on the really bad spots

3) if all else fails, look into actual paint work. maybe I can get the rear diffusers, side skirts - and THEN get a bulk quote for it all. . :)

I'm fond of the Langka products. I think you can find them at Langka.com

Try the various touch up paints first and if you are a PCA member, go to a concours clinic and learn how to do this correctly.

The problem with a respray is the depth of paint is instantly detected by a knowledgable PPI specialist (with their gauges).

If you use a product like Dr. Colorchip, let it dry longer before you rub the "magic" solution...also do not rub hard; you'll remove all the paint you just applied.

There is a good write-up in our March PCA- Chicago region monthly mag.:

http://www.pca-chicago.org/scene/SceneApr09.pdf

Having paid the high price for Dr Colorchip I was certain I would get good results. I followed the instructions to the letter and was very disappointed. I could have gotten better results with my kid's water colors.

I liked the writeup, thanks for the link. I wish our UCR region carried more usefull info rather than the wine/cheese/dinning stuff. (bleh)

go to a hobby store and you can get a tiny tiny tiny ultra tiny brush dot on the paint quickly do one quick light swipe with your finger wait a few minutes take nail polish remover and carefully remove the finger smudged areas do not rub too hard or it will rub what you just put on off
--- for small scrapes more like dulled from something rubbing across it take nail polish remover (acetone) wet rag with the acetone quickly apply your touch up paint to the RAG be quick acetone evaporates quickly take the wetted rag with acetone and a tiny bit of touch up and rub into the area takes some practice also works on small chips but try the tiny brush first then clean up with the acetone

Over the years I've had better luck with Langka than Dr. Colorchip. My original bottle of Langka Blob eliminator was finally used up and I was a bit reluctant to pay $25 for another small bottle of the stuff. After some searching with Google, I found this thread over on an Audi forum. I paid about $30 for a quart bottle of Winsor & Newton Brush Cleaner & Restorer and used some polishing compound I already had and made some of my own blob eliminator. My mixture was about 30% brush cleaner and 70% polishing compound. It works like the Langka stuff, but I think that my mixture may be a little too strong and I am going add some more polishing compound to thin it down some more. The 2 chips in my hood that are most annoying are pretty deep, and I think I should have filled them with some Bondo Putty Glaze first. I may end up starting over and doing that. Like the guy who posted the thread said in the Audi forum, I'm not a chemist, YMMV, but I think it's worth a try if you don't want to pay $25 for a tiny bottle of Langka Blob Eliminator.

I understand, pretty like cars, but I just drive it, chips and all. Once I stopped worrying about the little imperfections, ownership joy has been trending.
First car I had an expert at the dealership go over the car and it looked great. They use him for the expensive cars so why not? It took him several hours and cost 600 bucks. He used stock paint and some private technique. He said Dr colorchip rubbed right back out, wasn’t a fix.


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Go ask the various used car dealers who they use to fix chips, etc. When I lived in the Pac. NW, there were Roma men who made the rounds of the dealers and could mix and blend the paint and do almost perfect touch up. Pretty inexpensive. In Tucson, where I live, it's probably Hispanics. There are bunches of very skilled Hispanic car repair guys here. (Don't tell our illustrious President, btw.)

The local Maaco guys are Mexicans, they really do great work. I got my whole Highlander repainted, the stock color, for $1 grand. Looks like new.

Why does their race or ethnicity matter? You’re suggesting that different races or ethnicities have different skill sets or work ethics. That’s very bigoted. :confused:

You might want to rethink your wording ;)

Oh I think it's a fair statement, that we don't need to get offended about, if we take in the right context.

There are absolutely cultural differences which are evident in workmanship. I see this in the construction trades all day. That does not mean that a person is not capable of the same as another simply because they're a different ethnicity. What it means, is that their cultural differences lend themselves to a specific type of skill.

Islanders, For instance, tend to have a much lower expectation about how flat concrete needs to be. That is simply a difference in their cultural norm.
Hispanics seem to understand that sometimes working hard IS working smart: rather than trying to find more tools to make a job easier, or automate it, they just buckle-in and do the hours needed to make it look nice. This is why 90% of the time I can accurately tell you the ethnicity of the drywallers on one of my projects.

This is no different from someone having a preference over the ethnicity (or gender) of their massage therapist. Asians have a different massage technique than Russians, for instance. (Or so im told, Haha)

Roma people, traditionally and culturally, tend to stick to themselves. As such, their metiers (or skilled trade) tends to be passed down from generation to generation, and therefore the "old ways" / techniques, are as well.

Are these generalizations? Yup. Are they stereotypes? Absolutely. As such, they're rife with exceptions. But they shouldn't be offensive, or "racist", as such. It's not as though anyone is suggesting that a certain ethnicity CAN'T do something as well as another.

When I built an "old- world" project that needed "old- world" stucco on it, my usual stucco contractor told me that I needed to find "an old Greek guy, whose grandfather taught him that technique". It didn't strike either of us as offensive.

For the record: my family is Hispanic / American Indian of decent.

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BS.

I fall into one of those ethnicities and I don’t appreciate the generalization, especially coming from someone that just made a snide political comment (Brian).
I can do anything as well or better than anyone else. To say differently is idiotic.
There was absolutely no reason to bring race or ethnicity into it.

Period. End of discussion. :)

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