Well, I just got my car back (original MB paint was nasty...delaminated clear coat and many other issues...I redid it in the original color). It looks 10 million times better than it did, BUT...its not perfect. At $1250 I didn't really expect it to be, but I guess I'm a little disappointed in a couple of things. Maybe you guys can tell me if I'm being too **** for the money, and if there's anything short of a repaint that can correct it.

First...the hood and roof are pretty good, but there's some pretty significant orange peel along the sides. Second, I see in a few places what appear to be little bumps that look like tiny bubbles, or in some cases indents, as if there were bubbles that popped. It looks like they're in the clear coat.

Finally, there's one patch that is just foggy, and not shiny at all. This one I'm definitely going to complain about. I thought something got smeared on it, but it doesn't wipe off, or change at all when you rub it.

I don't have any pictures yet...like I said, overall and at first glance it looks great. Its just upon a bit closer inspection there are some pretty significant flaws. $1250 may not be a lot for a paint job, but it is quite a bit of money nonetheless, so I'd like to make sure that I at least got a reasonable job for what I paid.

For what its worth they took a lot of things off to paint it, which I didn't completely expect for the price. So that part was good I guess.

jds

 

It sounds like it needs to be machined-buffed out.

 

Do they have to re-clear coat it, or is that a finishing touch thing that they just didn't do enough of?

I'm painting process-ignorant, obviously :-)

 

I think you're justified to have them give you a perfect finish all around. The difference in cost IMO should be seen in prep work, color matching, and longevity. You should NOT see what appears to be issues with any part of a newly painted panel.

Dave

 

I just had my car done also two weeks ago and I was noticing the same imperfections as you did;
poped litle bubless all ower the body, very few spots of orange peal and dull nonshiny spots here and there so:
I made the guy sand down the car again completely,
buff the car again with compound and wash it and polish it.
The lilte poped bubless are still there but minimal or almoast invisible if you don't know they'r there and the dull nonshiny spots are almoast gone, I belive one more time of buffing will get'em all off.

What realy pisses me off is that the color is not so black, it looks like fadded black, during the day is OK but at night you can tell is not BB the way it should be.

Total was $1.500.

 

All I think is the finall buffing they didn't do right, to get rid off the foggy spots and the orange peal you don't need to clear coat again, I think with some good buffing compound all will go away.
Usualy after the painting they spray like 4 coats of clear coat so you should be OK clear coat wise.
This what I'm gonna do:
Go to auto store get some mothers buffing comp. and just hit the spots where needed and than wax.

 

I just had this same issue, though it took several weeks for it to form. It turned out to be a contaminate(sp) under the primer. Started out as pitting under the surface of the paint, then started to raise and spread. It'll only get worse and possible lead to rusting from the inside out. Get that fixed ASAP.

As far as the orange peel, they probably didn't take their time and put on too much paint on whichever coat. For $1,250 that might be what you get. Dunno the shop.

For the finish, it should be glossy all around. No dull spots. I would hope that they buffed and waxed before they gave it back to you.

 

They did buff and wax it. From a safe distance it looks great :-)

I think they "real" buffing, with compound and all, was probably not done with enough attention to detail, as some of you have said. I have to go back anyway when they get the windshield sprayer in (one of mine broke and they replaced 'em with this huge chrome thing with a light on it...I don't know about you guys, but...not on my car :-) I'll mention this stuff then.

jds