and yet another issue with paint...
I wanted to share my saddness with the rest of the forum...

A month or so before i was trying to park in a block and a smartass decided to install the ac compressor units just 30cm above the ground. I've had them in mind but the isle was so damn tight i didn't make it.

I deep scratched 2cm the passenger door and 3cm the rear door.

I started searching for a repair shop...

Having in mind the two previous resprayings (front and rear bumpers colour matching issues) i've had noticed the shops that if the colour doesn't match 100% they will have to redo the work without charge. All 4-5 shops guaranteed perfect match. and all insisted that we've not such issue with your colour blah blah...

I ended up to a shop that is dealing almost only with mazdas. Therefore they were supposed to know the matching difficulties. I paid EUR300 and the result is the worst ever. The paint is not even close to the other panels. It gets noticed from the first sight.
What i am asking you people is to give me your advise:
should i get bothered that much (i feel that i should given that i am paying for the work done)
should i trade the car in?
Or should i get the whole car resprayed.
I cannot stand it. It is hilarious for me.
Though have to say that the feel and look (apart of the colour) is 1000% perfect.

What should i do?

 

i definitely would not get the entire car re-sprayed. the factory paint's bake temperature is something like 200 or 300º F higher than any body shop can do. therefore, it's bonded better. also, a complete respray would cost a couple thousand dollars ($3500+) vs. just respraying 2 panels (maybe $1000+). also just because a body shop deals with mazdas doesn't mean they are good quality.

here's what i would suggest...

find a good & reputable body shop that deals with only higher-end luxury cars and have those 2 panels redone. a shop that deals with bmw, mercedes, lexus etc. probably are used to meeting higher quality standards due to the snobbiness & pickiness of their customers. if u really can't find one on your own, call the most reputable/ high end mercedes, bmw, or lexus dealership's service dept and ask who their authorized body shop is. and, go to that shop.

usually right after the re-spray the newly coated panels will look slightly brighter. but, it shouldn't look ridiculous and should be noticeable, but subtle. once your car's been out in the sun a couple weeks and gets some rays, the brightness should eventually even out and blend in with the rest of the car.

also, after the paint is done, wait about 30-45 days and have those panels detailed & waxed, maybe even along with the rest of the car.

 

No need to complete respray.

You just need to find a good shop.

my local garage can match the color 100%.

 

Agreed. All you need is a good shop that knows what they are doing. You can't even tell that my car has been abused by other stupid drivers. The front bumper has been fixed atleast 3 times. My passanger door and fender has recently been done and looks as if no one ever backed into it.

 

Thanks for your inpute guys. So, if i go for respraying it means that the 300eur i paid has gone + i will pay most probably some 500eur for the work done again in a reputable shop. therefore a total of 800eur for 5cm scratches...
i feel pity :P

 

I had my Lexus repaired and they matched the paint perfectly (mineral green metalic). The only way I can tell it's been repaired is because the shop couldn't match the original factory orange peel finish. Their's is smooth as glass. Factories use heat to dry paint not because it makes it stick better, it to dry faster for production. In addition, the factory paint has to be applied as thin as possible to meet evaporation standards for paint volatiles, a local shop doesn't have to meet that requirement and can actually put down a decent layer of paint.

 

Shouldn't the orangepeel go away with a little buffing. I can't tell at all what has been repaired on my car as they do a great job and buff the whole ar evertime it's been in.

now a buddy of mine has a VR RX-8 and a body kit he put on is completely different colors. The front is to light the back is to dark and the sideskirts are kinda orange or something like that. So the shop he used didn;t know what they were doing.

 

Your car's paint has faded since it was new. New paint will fade also. A good body shop will take this in to account. The repainted one won't match immediately. But, after time, the new paint should fade and match the present color of the rest of the car.

 

IDK my buddies 8 has seemes to be getting worse and more noticable everytime I see his 8 which is about 1-3 times every 2 months. There is a definite difference between the colors of the body(factory paint) and the kit. There is also a difference in the front and rear bumper and sideskirts. Nothing matches.

 

100% match is near impossible. A good painter can compensate with a good blend, and you will never ever see the blend....and everybody is happy. The paint itself will never be a 100% match, its like hitting the lottery. Out of 1,000 cars, we may get one (besides black), that is a truely perfect match. If you can see the blend, it was not painted properly. Do not paint the whole car. Stress to them that the color matching is very important. They make cheap base colors, and they dont have the correct pearls in the color, which make it not match to the eye. Electronically its the same color, but the eye sees the pearls different. And, there is alot of pearls in that color.

That blue is pretty damn easy to blend, so its possible to get it very close.

A note on the fading. As Al pointed out, the car is faded compared to new. The shop can compensate, but the metallics are what fades the most, and they do not make "faded" metallics. Its an impossible dream to get a perfect match without blending. And blending is a serious art. Its requires certain airpressures for certain colors, certain gun speed, distance, etc has to be right on the money or you will get blotches and see where the color was chopped off.

 

^ugh blending can be a nightmare....I can do pretty well with it for an amateur(been painting about 4 years--no schooling) , but man is it tough. It is nice when you are able to use a better quality paint though. I am using a paint made by house of kolor for the past year, so things have improved

 

This^

Someone hit me and the front bumper and drivers side front fender went bye bye. When I got the car back I could notice a HUGE difference in paint (black). Guy who painted it assured me after 2-3 months it would be hard to tell. He was right.

Yesterday I noticed something that looks like claw marks on my passenger side front fender. Something must of hit me while I was driving and I'm not sure what could of caused such damage. I will probably cough up the money to have it repainted (and debadged) since its a hassle to go through the insurance company.

 

Ya, House of Kolor makes good stuff. I have been playin around with some Kirker stuff, and I have to say I like it. It takes practice, and a good gun helps. I use an Iwata LPH-400 extreme for most basecoats, very good gun. Lays it better than OEM.

 

I have heard a lot of good things about Iwata--however some of the people I work with have not had much success with it. I have a DeVilbiss, don't know the model off hand. I used to have a Sata. I liked both.

 

You might be able to get it buffed out instead of a repaint

 

In my case they used blending. I got fixed the passenger and rear door. At the front fender you don't see any difference in colour (between the door panel and the fender) at the rear (where the rear door meets the rear fender) there is some difference but maybe I HOPE SO :P they will blend in time. To be honest its almost a month now and i have pointed some difference. What i am thinking now is to get painted the rear fender to have perfect colour match and to fix a couple of small dents.

 

DeVilbiss is a good gun, and the Sata's are considered great by the old school guys. The Iwata has a killer pattern and its tulip shaped so you get less overspray, and you can do everything at around 20-25psi which stirs up much less dust. If you take the old school approach with an Iwata (high pressure, stand back and hammer it), you have bad results. The new technology of the iwata make it king IMO.

 

Interesting outkast, I will have to play with the Iwata sometime.

 

Oh ya, anything else will feel like a primer gun. You use much less material, and much slicker finish...the money I save on material pays for the gun in 2 weeks.