Paintless dent removal or painted replacement fender?

[cb7 calling]

A friend of mine put a pretty nasty ding on my driver side fender. It's a 2014 tsx I have had for three months with less than 20,000 miles. I'm concerned they can not do a good job on dent repair on one hand and worried about paint match and fitment on the other. I think I will post my giant pic then take it back down.[/IMG]
What do you guys think? Well pics not up cause I'm tech challenged but it's huge so for the better. Basically it's two half dollar dings next to each other with a fingernail size paint chip.

[Raf99]

Just had my 04 TSX done through dent removal, the one in the rear was bad and deep. Did a perfect job! But you have to go to a reputable shop and they cannot fix missing paint.

But if you took this to a body shop, I'm pretty sure they would want to replace the whole door or paint the whole door. Depends on the damage.

Conclusion = dent removal shops do work but cannot fix missing paint.

[cb7 calling]

The small paint chip is the curve ball for me. The dent removal quote including paint match is the price of a painted fender online. I think I'm going to let the dent guy do it because a pre painted fender won't match either right? I would also have to do all the fender removal/install myself then see if a detail guy can buff to match it up. The dent guy said the price is high for the paint to look "like new" so I'm going to give him a whack at it. I feel like he is going to get the dents out then have someone else mess with paint cause he said it would take three days idk.

[Raf99]

Ya. You are taking a chance no matter where you go unless you take it to the dealership. So if you are not willing to pay top dollar don't expect top notch repairs. Plain and simply. If you want perfect, take it to Acura. They'll send it to their body shop where perfection is a must.

[cb7 calling]

True..I should at least get a dealer quote. I might not even do that though. I have a pretty good idea I can "fix" this and the other two very small dings for less than a dealer on this one. It's not going to be a show car and most likely won't be the last ding. Here I go supporting the aftermarket and ruining the scene.

[Fleetw00d]

I've had a couple paintless dent repair guys here in Ohio do a very good job on several of my cars. One of them took about a dozen small dents out of my wagon, several on my wife's car, and one on one of the replacement quarters for Ruby (been a while ago) for $300. Unfortunately, they have so much business in their shops now that they won't make house calls. I believe it is worth a try so that you don't have to take everything apart.

[Raf99]

Plunger time

[deevergote]

Dealerships are even questionable at times. I've had some issues with the quality of dealership work. Although I had my CTS-V repaired at an official GM body shop (actually part of a Buick dealership... and Hyundai... ) and they did a great job.

Ultimately, if you have any professional body work done, do as much research on their work as possible. Stop in a few times and look at the cars they've finished. Ask questions. If their work looks to be done well, trust them.
For example, I know the Maaco near me does a GREAT job painting. Body work sucks, but paint work is better than some "real" paint jobs (I can think of one $4000 paint job on a CB7 that comes to mind...) I scoped them out first, and asked around... and I got the quality of work that I expected from them.


How much is the paintless dent repair? If it's cheap, give it a shot. If it doesn't turn out to your liking, you'll be having the panel removed anyway!

[cb7 calling]

I think it was 350 or 400. Yeah I'm going to give it a shot.

[cb7 calling]

Got the car back last night and I am satisfied. I would grade it a 93% while the guy at the shop gave it a 98%. Honestly nobody would ever know it's a repair. Paint match is perfect and I had to turn the car around in the lot to change lighting to deduct any points overall. Basically I got a 900 dollar job for 400. This was the shop all the dealers use and they where super cool. They pulled five more dings for 125. Two I knew of and three they found. Auto dentz in Wilmington nc ftw.

[Raf99]

Got the car back last night and I am satisfied. I would grade it a 93% while the guy at the shop gave it a 98%. Honestly nobody would ever know it's a repair. Paint match is perfect and I had to turn the car around in the lot to change lighting to deduct any points overall. Basically I got a 900 dollar job for 400. This was the shop all the dealers use and they where super cool. They pulled five more dings for 125. Two I knew of and three they found. Auto dentz in Wilmington nc ftw.

Ya, glad you went and got it fixed. So what did you deduct points for?

haha, ya, same when I went for a quote. I was like "looking for a price to take these 3 dents out". It was a girl doing the quote, and she was like, "what about the other 4?" ... lol. Then continued to walk around the car pointing out dents I never knew existed.

[cb7 calling]

First all the paintless dents are perfect. The main dent shows evidence of repair after about sixty seconds with your face about 6-10 inches away. There are three imperfections in the paint that can't be seen from the standing position. That's it. My best description of the repair is its a perfect "repair".

[cb7 calling]

Two days back from repair, two more dings! You know when I bought the car one of the warranties covered dings and I was like no way bro. Coulda paid for itself it turns out. I am done now though time to buy some of those bullet hole decals I guess.