Ok, so I'm not going to go into the gorey details of it, but it ends up that my like new '04 brilliant black 8 that has been sitting under a car cover for the past few months is in desperate need of repair. The front got hit so now I need to get a new hood, front nose, and driver's side front wheel well. It happened, I'm dealing with it, but I want to make sure that I go about repairs in the right way so that I don't end up paying through the nose when I don't have too.

I'm thinking that just going through the mazda dealership is the best way to go, anyone have opinions either way about this??

I'm also worried that if something else happens with the engine somewhere down the road, and the dealer knows about this that they will try to get out of the warrenty and tell me that it's my problem...too bad.

Any advice on this is appreciated, thanks.

Pics would help so we can see the extent of the damage. I think there are a lot of shops qualified to do the work, so you need to find what works best for you, time in shop, cost, location, etc...

Well, are you sure there's no damage to the frame???

Here's some rough numbers for some of the parts...

Front Bumper Cover: ~$400
Black Grille: ~$295
Lower Spoiler: ~ $110

Ask the dealership if they can recommend a good bodyshop that they use and that gets OEM parts from mazda..

How did it happen?

It's been my experience that dealerships don't do particularly good body work. Many send the car to a local body shop that does okay-but-not-great work. If you're not real fussy or anal, it'll probably be good enough, but if you want really good work, find a great body shop and take your car there. To find the best shops, call some of the high-end dealers in town (Porsche, Bentley, Ferrari), ask for service, and ask them which body shop they send their cars to. Good luck!