I was just wondering if anyone here knows anything about paint on cars. The reason I ask is because I had my front end of my 96 Camaro painted in November of 09. I had the car painted by the local Chevrolet dealer ship. They did a prety good job I think. The question I had is, how common is it for pieces of the hood to get chipped off by rock chips from the road. It's only been like 6 months and I already have 3 decent size dings. The dealer claims this is common on any paint service you get anywhere. My old original hood didn't chip nearly as easy. In fact my old hood wouldn't chip off paint, but rather create a small almsot white clear scrath. Not a whole half penny sized hole.

The dealer also says that any other place I go to to get it painted the same will happen. He told me that Corvettes and Cobalts recieve the same paint, and that it goes for all their cars they make. I don't know why but I thought maybe they spent more time, or money on better/more materials for a flawless job on their higher end cars. If rock chips did do this to my car, I'm afraid in 12 months what it will look like... I didnt have this problem with my old hood.


If it is common for hoods to chip almost effortlessly after being painted, is there a way to protect it. Or is it supposed to be more durrable, did I just get a cheap half assed job done?

Thanks for reading. Any thought on the matter would be much appreciated!

 

The paint used on the hood is the same as used everywhere else on the car.
It is possible that they didn't spray enough coats of color or clear.
How long after the paint job did you start driving the car? Most auto paint will be pretty soft for the first couple of days, and shouldn't be washed or waxed for the first 30 days or so.

 

I'm not sure. when i spoke to the guy the day before I picked it up they were still painting it. So probably drove it after it sat for 1 maybe 2 days tops. The guy at the dealer told me that when they release the vehichle its ready to drive and wash/wax. In fact they washed and waxed my car before I picked it up that night.

Here are some pics of the chipped paint spots. there are 3 decent sized ones after only 6 months...








They did the paint on the hood, front right fender, and bumper.. (they also stripped the hood before paiting it, whatever that means)

 

they stripped the paint and primer off to work with a fresh surface.

now, i'm not sure if washing and waxing was a good idea right away. usually you want to let the paint settle for a few days before you consider doing something like that. the best thing you can do after a paint job is let your car sit out in the sun as much as you can so the paint bakes and settles.

now, rock chips are just part of the game. just because your original hood didn't do it doesn't mean they did a bad job. maybe you had some rocks thrown at you while driving? i will say that i had my car painted a year ago and it still looks flawless.

if i were you, i'd take it to another body shop you trust and see what they think about it

 

The paint used on one place of the car is pretty much the same as any other place with the exception of the bumper covers. These have a flexible additive to allow the paint to flex and not crack when bent.

As for the chips this can happen if the paint is not laid down properly. There could be many different reasons for the chipping, improper mixing of the undercoats, improper prepping of the undercoats, cheap quality paint and undercoats, and many more.

As for washing you can do this right after the paint cools if it has been baked or wait about 2 or 3 days if it was allowed to dry naturally. DO NOT wax fresh paint for a few MONTHS after painting. This will seal the solvents that are trying to escape (you want this it hardens the paint) and trap them below the surface. Once they get trapped they lift the topcoats and leave little craters. This is called solvent popping and to fix this you need to sand the paint back to the undercoats or metal depending on how deep the solvent popped.

Sorry to hear about your troubles but it sounds like you will be needing to repaint your hood sometime.

Massey

 

I know a lot about painting and mechanics of cars, seems being how im always in the shop with my uncle. first of all it should not chip so easily. Like somebody said in the previous post, they never used enoguh coats. Man anytime my uncle paints cars, it lasts for at least 5 years and we drive on dirt roads where there are rocks all the time. and the other question you asked is what does stripping the car mean. it means the sanded off all the old paint. put on primer and painted it color coded to the color you want it. good luck. but I would suggest taking it back, cuz it aint suppose to do that man. there full of **** if they are saying all cars do that. Man they just dont want to paint it again and lose there money, take it back and get a refund.

 

Thanks for all of the advice. Wish it were easier to find good service. chevy mechanic if you lived near my area, I would pay you to paint it in a heartbeat.

I took my car today to serveral professional body/paint shops. Every one told me the paint job was not good quality almost instantly after looking at the work. In fact the guy at the cadillac dealer paint shop said I need to skip the supervisor and speak to their GM. He told me the hood was not stripped down, and if it was that it looked poorly/done too quick. He even pointed out small dings on the hood I had not noticed before. He even found a spot that has some cracking under the clear coat or that it may be sanding patterns that were not smoothed out properly under the paint.

I am very pissed, and feel taken advantage of. I'm going to talk to the GM tomorrow first thing after I get off of work. They are going to do it right, or give me a refund. I paid cash for good service. Not so you could half *** it, or speed thru it.

I wish I did know of a good paint shop to trust. Honestly I live in a big city and dont know of any auto paint shops to trust. There is a lot out there. I trusted the chevy dealer because they work on these cars all the time. But I guess that makes them lose interest in painting each car with good quality like as if it was their own.

I'm not talking smack about all the chevy dealers(I'm sure there are good ones out there), just this on by my house for sure is not a good one for paint/body work.

 

If you dont mind me asking where do you live? a way to find a quality body shop in your area call insurance companies/agents and ask them who they prefer for claims work. Let me tell you, a body shop messes up a couple of cars and the insurance companies take their claims to other shops. I used to work for a bodyshop that had about 90% of its total business from insurance recommendations. There was another local shop that was taking the insurance money for new OEM parts and buying reproduction parts at a lower cost. My shop got alot busier when that happened and it took years for that shop to recover and if it was not for an alignment shop that was part of the same company they would have went under over that. They didn't have enough evidence to take the shop to court but the insurance companies pulled their customers from this shop and they suffered. So talk to them even if it is not your own agent and see what shops they prefer. If you keep hearing the same name from different agents then you can pretty much figure it is a good shop.

Good luck getting your hood fixed and if the dealer's GM will not assist you go to the franchise owner or GM itself

Massey

 

I spoke to the GM today. He was very understanding and honest with me. He even called the body shop supervisor to see the paint job. It turns out the cracking on the hood under the clear coat was "bleed through". I asked the supervisor what causes bleed through, he said the primer didnt sit/dry long enough. So I was able to make them admit they did a poor/quick job on my car. Not only the bleed through, there were 3 spots with overspray, including a horrible looking one by the camaro badge on the hood!

The GM was not happy at all to hear that the supervisor told me they do 400 cars a month. I told him that in my mind when I heard this, I heard "we speed through our work."
I told the GM this before I ever asked them what causes bleed through. Speeding through your work!

The work was obviously poorly done. By the way it's the ray huffines chevrolet dealer at the NW corner of coit and plano parkway, in Plano TX.

They agreed it was poorly done. Niether of them would want that quality of work on their own cars.(I know, I asked both of them.) They are going to repaint it and try to make it right. They are also going to put their best painters on this one, he assured me. I guess those are the guys that do the corvettes? lol I don't know. They are also paying for the loaner car and refunding me what I paid on having the paint stripped.

Come to think of it. I have to remove my halo lights if they are respraying the bumper..

She goes to the shop on Tuesday. They say it's going to take 3 days. I guess that's enough time? I'll post pics when I get her back!

Thanks for everyones input!

 

glad to hear your car is getting done right. 400 cars a month would be a great month for a shop lke Maaco or Earl Schwibe but for a collision center to do that many is rushing it. Oh and we all know the quality of Maaco and ES paint jobs. 3 days in the shop for paint is about average, and they are going to have to strip the hood now, that bleed through is all the way down to the metal. (the lifting accured with the origional paint reacting to poor prepwork and too thick of an application of the primer.)

In preping my car for paint I have over 8 hours on the fender alone and that was just sanding and prepping it for the painters. I didnt have all the materials I needed to prep the door properly so I left that to the shop to finish for me but that would have been around another 8-10 hours to get it right. I had about 3 hours into prepping the jamb to cut it in and make it look like nothing has ever happened to the door. My car was dropped off at 8:30 AM on tuesday and it was in the booth getting cleared and baked at about 3:30 today. The car will not be ready to pick up till about 11:00 tomorrow. If that helps give you an idea of what goes into "proper" paintwork. Check out my bad day thread to see what my car looked like when it went to the painters.

Massey