Titanium Silver Clearcoat failure

Starting to have clearcoat failure at the left rear quarter panel on my 00' E39it. It's a small area about 6" long by 2" high. It really isn't much now but it really bothers me and the look of the car.



Has anyone out there tackled this sort of repair? Maybe a short DIY? I'm just wondering how hard it would be to fix it myself. I can say that my mechanical skills are above average but my painting skills need more to be desird.



Body shop is asking $450 to re-do the quarter panel.

On my 92 VW Cabriolet, I just had/have the same problem. Went to Pep Boys bought a roll of one inch Carbon Fiber tape and put it on from the mirror to the back window angling up to match trim. Figuring I would fix it later/ also protecting from getting worst. Looked great, but then I saw my BMW on the lot and traded the VW in for the Bimmer this September.

I think that you could repair that yourself. Have an auto paint store mix a pint a pint of lacquer, mix with correct thinner and put on a few light coats of paint. Ask the guys at the paint store how best to do the repair. THere is some sanding, and rubbing out involved, but it is doable. I have done small areas on cars like yours with great results. Body shops always want to paint the entire panel for even a small repair.

Originally Posted by jayster0966

Starting to have clearcoat failure at the left rear quarter panel on my 00' E39it. It's a small area about 6" long by 2" high. It really isn't much now but it really bothers me and the look of the car.

Has anyone out there tackled this sort of repair? Maybe a short DIY? I'm just wondering how hard it would be to fix it myself. I can say that my mechanical skills are above average but my painting skills need more to be desird.



Body shop is asking $450 to re-do the quarter panel.

I have little to zero experience with clearcoat failure. This said, ever since I saw this amazing turnaround on an '86 black MB that I would have sworn had extensive and terrible cc failure, I now often second guess myself! Now if you were showing off a Corolla, yeah, no doubt; you sneeze on it and it has cc failure. I'm sure the MB turnaround probably had a lot to do with the quality of cc being put on.

But . . . did the E39s all have Ceramiclear? Which is a very, very tough and durable clearcoat, right? (Basically, at the opposite end of the durability spectrum, compared to certain other Japanese econobox cars.)

Then, when I see cc failure, it's pretty much always on the horizontal panels firstly, as in hood/roof/trunk. IOW, I find it a bit unusual that you would have failure at that spot, but not at these other aforementioned panels.

So I found a different thread, while googling for the MB and it was one of the first hits was a different misdiagnosis, where the owner was happy that it wasn't failure after all, I'll link it too, though I didn't really read it yet.

Anyway, you might want to try polishing first. You never know? But maybe you're certain.

86 Mercedes turbo diesel 27 hours of polishing Barry Theal Presidential Details

I thought it was Clearcoat Failure... Got Lucky!

Actually, now that I look at it, it probably is not CC failure, since when the CC fails (also known as topcoat surface delamination in the paint business), the clear fails but you can still see the color coat (dull basecoat). Not sure why the white appears so evident in that picture. If CC failure, the dull silver would be visible.

What you saw was a reconditioning of oxidized single stage paint. Clear coat failure wil be tougher to correct. Someone on the Autogeek forum posted a repair that turned out well. What he did was to sand the area, apply new clear coat and then wetsand it to blen it in.

Originally Posted by Munich77

What you saw was a reconditioning of oxidized single stage paint. Clear coat failure wil be tougher to correct. Someone on the Autogeek forum posted a repair that turned out well. What he did was to sand the area, apply new clear coat and then wetsand it to blen it in.

Ah, thanks, that's good info. Do you happen to imply that you do think that is cc failure in the OP? I wonder what cc would best match up with Ceramiclear. I believe my plastic's clear is PPG, so I guess I imagine that the rest of the car might be as well.