Painting

[yuhou411]

so i have a messed up rear bumper... i want to get it fixed( i was planning to get a new one and paint it.. but then i was thinking ...i want to paint my whole car!! cuz theres a lot of chips in the front bumper and a lot of spots of touch up paint on my hood..so i went to maaco today to get a estiamte of how much to just paint a rear bumper. thye said 600 cuz they have to put the bumper on and blend the color. and then they told me i should jsut repaint my whole car. they said they could do that and fix the bumper for it for 1700.00 ...i know that maaco has a bad reputation but tey do offer a 5 year warrenty. however im relli not sure what to do... i was wondering if you guys had experience with maaco. they showed me their results and they looked decent. i live around san jose. any other good priced auto paint shop reconmendations would be great!

[Bimrpwr]

well a good shop will charge around 5-6k to respray the car.

Just remember you get what you payfor.

[olds72]

I say paint it yourself. I did mine and I have never painted before. I did all the body work, e.g door dings rust, feathered out the chips. Then I primered it and block sanded it and then applied the paint. I asked alot of questions at body shops, read some books. Now I didn't get a 5K apint job, but I'm not embarased to take it any where either. I spent close to $500 dollars on material and about 2 week doing the body work. I waited a bout 2 weeks after I painted it and then wet sanded the whole car and buffed it out. I'm getting ready to do my 2nd bimmer now.

[drivinfaster]

price around, get estimates in writing, and get specific details on what will be done. items like ding/dent removal, repairing rust spots, and such need to be taken care of prior to work being done. some shops (like maaco, earl shieb, and such) have gotten a bad rap because people didn't read the fine print. i worked with a guy that got his van painted a a maaco and it came out great. he didn't have the dings removed as the van was his beater that was completely faded (the 80's were not a good decade for gm paint...) he wanted a regular prep and spray. that's what he got. it looked great, he was happy, end of story.
on the other hand, i had to spray my car a different color FAST. (let's just say i didn't think they grew them guys that big on the island, and he didn't look that big sitting in his car) if you paint your own car, remember to use a filter to catch any moisture in the line, and keep the pressure low. lets say everything was black, whether it needed to be or not. it just didn't stay that way too long. horrible adhesion. paint was way too thick. but, lessons learned with that experience.
hope this helps.
drivinfaster

[Mary99]

..so i went to maaco today to get a estiamte of how much to just paint a rear bumper. thye said 600 cuz they have to put the bumper on and blend the color. and then they told me i should jsut repaint my whole car. they said they could do that and fix the bumper for it for 1700.00 ...i know that maaco has a bad reputation but tey do offer a 5 year warrenty.

Maaco is one of those good from far and far from good things....when prepping they don't wash and sand their cars, they wash and then "chemically scrub" them before painting. Any little bumps from sticky road debris gets painted over and is visible. Oh and the horrible oversprays that tell everyone you had a Maaco job.

I used them about 18 years ago when I painted a white car to a yellow cab during my college years and nothing much has changed since then. Why change a good profitable thing right? It was a cab, I didn't care but you can definately tell it was a Maaco job. :)