[rsultan84]

Over the summer, I got my 2005 e46 ZHP in titanium silver. I love. GREAT car. The ZHP has been a dream car of mine since it came out in '03

And here comes the but- There are NUMEROUS deep chips on the hood/nose area. Thankfully, they aren't very noticeable since the car is silver. Regardless, I want to tackle them.

I brought the car to the body shop that is associated with my dealership and he said that he wouldn't do touch-up on it because there are too many chips and they are too deep (they are as big as say a pencil eraser and look like they go all the way through in depth). He also pointed out that my car has an abnormal number of chips and thinks the hood has already been replaced once and that it was not painted well and that is why its chipping. Not being the original owner, I don't know any better. But the car is "free" of accidents according to carfax.

So, he is only willing to sand down the whole hood and repaint it from scratch or just buy a new hood and paint that. The latter being cheaper. I'm looking at 1300 bucks to do that... and that is w/o him even blending it with the fenders. WOOF! I'd also like to the point out... there are NO actual dents to car. Just chips.

So my questions are- Is it true that if he were to retouch them that they might be too numerous, big and deep for it to look decent?

Assuming that it is "touch-up able", I was going to try and do some of it myself. I bough the official BMW touch-up paint for my color. The general idea I have seen for the method is that one cleans the area thoroughly with alcohol, then allows a small amount of paint to roll off a tooth pic into the chip... let dry... and repeat until the chip is filled so that it slightly bubbles. Then lightly sand it down. What are people's thoughts on this method? Can my chips be too big numerous and deep for it to work and look okay?



All help is appreciated!

 

[dboy11]

If you have peppered rock chips for years of driving, the paint shop was right...a few here and there can be repaired....but when you look at lots of chips, its hard to fill them all in. Plus its hard to get them to match with some colors.


All that said look around for a good detailer and see what they can do for you...in some cases they might have someone that will tackle the job...but I don't hold a lot for what the car is going to look like after...in most cases after you fill the hole it looks worse than if you just left it alone.

Repainting the bumper would be a good thing to look at as well..

 

[aDoBo]

Good thread, I have numerous rock chips due to commuting

=[

 

[rsultan84]

Am I better off paying someone else to do it? A Lot of people on here talk about doing it themselves and it coming out great.

 

[dboy11]

Am I better off paying someone else to do it? A Lot of people on here talk about doing it themselves and it coming out great.

If you where talking about a few chips then DIY would be noting to take on, but it sounds like you have a lot...in the years that I have detailed and tried to fix chips I have never really liked the results...I say find a pro

 

[SlimKlim]

My family owns a mobile auto body business and we charge $99 dollars to touch it up professionally. Touching anything up unless it is done with obsessive care on a relatively small spot, is never going to be perfect, but It will look better and stop it from rusting.

 

[dboy11]

My family owns a mobile auto body business and we charge $99 dollars to touch it up professionally. Touching anything up unless it is done with obsessive care on a relatively small spot, is never going to be perfect, but It will look better and stop it from rusting.

You got a link to a site or something that shows this process