dgeesaman

iTrader: (7)

What would you do differently now that you've done it?

I'm getting mine repainted the original Vintage Red. Hoping to get everything with fresh paint outside the engine bay. I'd like to learn from your experiences.

hkguy783

i had my painted... and im happy
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purerx7

iTrader: (61)

Definitely stick with an OEM color or a color you can easily touch up, ie don't go the candy paint route. Pay a little extra and choose a quality shop, this isn't something you should nickel and dime as the more prep work that is put in the better the paint will come out. Make sure the door jams and trunk get re-sprayed too, I regret not having them spray the engine bay. Put a rev limiter in place so they can't joy ride in your car and expect to wait at least 30% longer then however long they tell you it will take.

I guess mine came out okay in the end

Nik da Greek

Make sure that when the shop take the rear glass out they use a proper Mazda seal to put it back in again, not some eBay-tastic ****. It may cost around £90 (whatever that is in US$ about 150?) but worth it. Otherwise you find that your boot very quickly fills with water when it rains and your nicely newly painted bootlid rusts from the inside out.

I'm not bitter. Not any more lol.

PS "boot" probably should read "trunk"? Sorry!

7racer

Hey dgeesaman,

good to see you still on the forum! I don't know if you remember but I went with a color change to IBM. I love the new color and would never go back to MB.

However, if I would have to do it again, I would have had preferred to have to have done it like a restoration with a full paint from the frame up.

Like has been said, there are always spots that show that they can't paint. I would say that they did a 99% job that most people wouldn't notice but it's still slightly annoying.

Also, the guys that did my paint did some "touch ups" that you can see the secondary spray when they went back. So after I "FINALLY" get my build done, I will be sending it to another shop for a re-re-paint.

Also, despite them covering the car...I found some areas of overspray particularly on suspension pieces.

YMMV but it can be annoying.

Since then, I have preferred doing vinyl wraps to the car. Easily reversible...and you can change on a whim.

7racer

here is a link to my current matte silver look on my GT-R
http://www.nagtroc.org/forums/index....l=matte+silver

and when I first did it matte black when it had <1000 miles on it.
http://www.nagtroc.org/forums/index....opic=28086&hl=

I also know there are metallic wrap colors too...though, probably won't have as much "depth" as real metallic paint.

What I might end up doing is getting the car repainted again in IBM and clear bra the whole car for protection or satin clear wrap the 7

purerx7

iTrader: (61)

How much does a wrap typically run? Any problems with long term durability? I have never seen one in person.

Natey

iTrader: (19)

I had my car repainted back to the stock color about two years ago and couldn't be happier. It's like 1993 again.
Haha! I swear, this website is the only place on earth that doesn't love Montego Blue.

7racer

depends, it can be around 2k to 4k seems the going rate.

No problems with durability but think about it more like a clear bra. They quote that it last 5-7 years. Main problems are that it will show the paint in seams and door cracks so a black or darker car is easier to wrap.

Also, since they custom every car, they have to use a razor to cut so sometimes the wrap can have a bit of a jagged edge.

Certainly cons to it like a repaint. But I like the ability to easily change and keep the base color. Also, if you beat up just the front, all you have to do is rewrap that portion.

The best thing about it is maintenance. With my black GT-R I was worried about constantly having to wash and wax it, with the vinyl, you should soap, rinse, dry.

dgeesaman

iTrader: (7)

Thanks for the tips. We talked about pulling the glass and he says he'll have his glass guy come out and look at it. I'm leaning toward having that done.
I have no worries about color coverage - my paint problem is fading and exterior damage, so the hard-to-reach places still have the same color and aren't faded. I plan to have him mix up extra color paint so that I could have the engine bay redone later if the engine's out.

Right now I'm also debating whether to let them disassemble stuff for prep (interior plastics, bumper covers, door panels, hood, hatch / spoiler, etc) or go over to the shop myself and do it myself. I'm not a pro but I've done it all before, and if they do it I suspect they won't know which parts are expensive as sin and won't be as careful. I also hope to be sure that no fasteners go missing. At the very least I'd give them the Mazda manual so they can see where the clips and tabs are and how to remove stuff properly.

IIRC, Vintage Red was available in the "high reflex" color option. The shop guy recommended going with the same color but in a single stage.

Would you suggest getting extra layers of clear coat?

My front bumper cover has some scratches and crap from an off-road excursion - does that stuff sand out ok?

Thanks,

David

Tuesday

iTrader: (18)

lmao. I love the look on my friends faces when they are like "hey man, this (insert piece here) has been broken for a while. Then I tell them the price of it, and suddenly they understand.

Also, I'm not familiar with the "high reflex" color option. Would you mind shedding a little light on this for a noob?

dgeesaman

iTrader: (7)

The high reflex paint option was never very well documented. I think only the original window sticker really described if the car was painted with it or the standard paint variety. As best as I could tell from what other said, the high reflex was a 2-stage color coating.

I could try to pull some "facts" about it off the top of my head but they'd probably be wrong, and I don't have the time to search out what others have said about it.

GoodfellaFD3S

iTrader: (213)

I'd definitely recommend pulling the interior pieces yourself-- no one cares about your car like you do

Many years ago I opted to go with a VR three stage job with Spies Hecker paint and recently went with Glasurit clearcoat when I had to fix things up after a small fender bender. Most important thing is to go with a top-notch shop who will spend the time prepping everything, and use quality materials.

P.S. One thing i regret is not having my fenders rolled before paint. You may not want it done now, but you never know what'll happen down the road

dgeesaman

iTrader: (7)

Heh, I called the paint shop and they're rockin and rollin already. They have some dents to remove and work out so they won't spraying immediately but I need to go over some things.

Do you think removing the mirrors is necessary? (I'm inclined to do it)

David

GoodfellaFD3S

iTrader: (213)

^^Fo shizzy, I would (and did).

DaleClark

iTrader: (55)

Yeah, definitely remove all the little stuff beforehand. They may want to do some of the parts off the car like the bumpers, mirrors, etc.

All the side lights, etc. go ahead and remove them. Either remove them at the shop or do it at home and get it towed to the shop or some combination. No one will treat your car as nicely as you do.

I would also recommend getting new headlight covers if yours haven't been replaced. You don't want to get the car all painted then 2 weeks later your fresh painted headlight cover goes flying .

This is also the time if you want to add OEM mudguards, add/delete the rear spoiler, etc.

On paint, I would definitely go for base/clearcoat instead of single stage paint. Clear is nice and hard and is easy to buff imperfections out of down the road.

If you have any small dings on the car get a paintless dent removal guy to fix those first. They can do it better, faster, and far cheaper than a body shop and you'll save on labor bigtime.

The one killer on the price with a bodyshop is labor. Anything you can do to help by disassembling parts and re-assembling cuts money off the bill. If it takes 2 hours to remove the front and rear bumpers, that's 2 hours of labor you're paying, usually $80 or so an hour. Same goes for doing the dent removal beforehand, having the shop use a stud gun and work on a dent is a lot of time and time's money.

If you have any panels that are bad or need a lot of work it might be worth tracking a good one down first. Fenders, hoods, hatches, doors, etc. - that's typically better to get a good used one, put it on, then have them paint instead of having them fix the part.

Scratches in the front bumper are no biggie. If it's just in the paint that will all be sanded down. If it's gouged into the urethane they can repair that, there's special filler for urethane to build the scratch up then they paint over it good as new.

Speaking of, when I had my bumpers repainted I went to the '99 style "Mazda" and "RX-7" on the rear bumper and had them fill the small holes where the stock "Mazda" badge attached. That was super easy for them to do and didn't cost much if anything.

I'm not sure about the high reflex jazz, really just get a good basecoat/clearcoat in VR and you'll be just fine.

Dale

dgeesaman

iTrader: (7)

Thanks Dale and Rich.

The shop got started yesterday and I took a half day off work today to help remove trim and stuff. He had all of the front and rear bumper stuff removed and today I pulled all door trim, mirrors, and front fenders. I forgot to ask him about the antenna mast. So far my only casualties are one of the front fender scoops and the clips that hold the beltline molding on the doors. (If there is a trick to those, it's not obvious even after it's pulled apart). I already had the headlight covers on my to replace list.

We're leaving the hatch and windshield glass in place because he feels he can peel back and tape the existing trim and get well under the visible edge. We're painting door jambs but not anything in the engine bay. He thinks the front bumper will clean up fine. For the body he's planning on 3 coats of single stage color and 3 coats of clear. If anyone here remembers Barry Jaminet (Kwikrx7) I saw his VR FD after it was repainted but before he sold it and it looked great.

Back in the spring I visited a few shops for estimates and hadn't done anything about it. While I was at fishing camp last week, my wife took the car to my "chosen" body shop to have them get started. It's a great gift, but I was planning on removing all of this stuff and getting the car towed over to the shop. As you know there are plenty of things that must be communicated so that costs stay contained and there aren't too many shortcuts in the work. Anytime I thought about it I got worried. Now that I can see the car ready for prep and he's only expecting a cost increase over the estimate because of the paint materials, I'm feeling relieved that this will turn out well. He's also cool with me doing work there and not getting in the way, so when the painting is done I can probably come back and help reinstall a bunch of the stuff.

Supernaut

iTrader: (83)

Noooo repaint it OEM!

dgeesaman

iTrader: (7)

??

VR = Vintage Red = OEM color

DaleClark

iTrader: (55)

That will look sweet on the 22" rims!

Post up some pics as progress marches along! Also, how much is it running for the job? One of these days my car needs a full repaint but it's quite a bit. I did a spot fix on it a year and a half ago - repainted the front/rear bumpers, 99 side skirts, rear mud guards, new headlight covers, RE-Amemiya wing. Some of the paint I actually did myself, it's a HARD damn job. It bought me some time but the car really needs a repaint.

Of course nothing covers up old tired black paint like 20 square yards of racing stripe vinyl....



Dale

rajeevx7

iTrader: (11)

If I did mine again, I would get them to sand out all of the rocker panel anti-rock chip coating and paint it smooth all the way around.

I would not even consider a single stage paint on a car of this caliber!

dgeesaman

iTrader: (7)

I think I'm getting my terminology mixed up. The car will be 3 coats of red, with 3 coats of clearcoat. If that's what you call a 2-stage paint then that's what it is.

What I know we're not doing is a base color with a different color sprayed over that followed by clear coat. According to my Mazda Collision manual, the NU (Vintage Red) color was only done in three stage in 1995.

I should have taken some pics today when I was over there.

abc

I had every just about every removable piece removed to be painted separate from the body. I also had all the larger pieces blocked until smooth. Rock guard was removed and windshields were pulled out.
I went with a different approach with a custom mix paint of pearls and metallics combined (dupont blk lava red pearl custom mixed). There' s about 2 gallons of clear on the car (lots of cutting afterwards)....about 5k total when done. I wish the engine bay was painted but it would set me back another 2k...

abc

Soooo true!! Glad I rolled mines before hitting the paint booth.

whiteweazel21

iTrader: (2)

Supernaut, any updates on painting your second car? I'd be curious for your results when you have them!