devongarver

OK, so I have a problem.
There is damage on the passenger side of my car, courtesy of the government forcing us to move out of our house in the middle of a f*cking Blizzard. Nice.

Now, luckily this happened putting the car on the trailer-not that i would have even made it out of the driveway since i couldn't even get it up the trailer without having to dump 6 50lb bags of sand down and get a running start. FML I hate snow.

OK so the pics won't attach...I just posted them to image shack.
Here are the 3 links, I never learned how to embed images so this is what you get lol.

Image 1
Image 2
Image 3


So anyways, I went to see a local shop to get an estimate. I found out after I got there this guy is the cheapest guy around, but does decent work. He is a one man crew so he has little overhead, and charges less.

Basically, the paint is completely shot on my car. I Have known this since last year, but I didnt care because EVENTUALLY I planned on repainting it-Just not YET!

Now that I have this damage, I am worried about the metal starting to rust. The guy said it would be about 2800$-3000$ to fix my car and do a total repaint. Now, don't get me wrong, that seems like a decent price compared to what i expected to hear, but I just don't have 3k in my piggy bank feel me? More over,...if I DID have 3k...I sure as hell wouldn't spend it on something that didnt improve the speed, handling, or drive-ability of my car. I still have 3 boxes of suspension goodies i haven't even had time to isntall because of the whole House situation, and I need to fix the steering leak, all new brakes are needed BAD, Fuel filler neck gasket is leaking(have the part, no time to put it in yet), needs all new shocks(so of course I am goign to just upgrade the rest of the suspension while I'm at it)...not to mention the power and ground wiring under the hood needs replaced...the cowl is gone, completely shattered and in the trash can...

See where I'm going with this? I have no desire to do anything with the paint until i have a SOLID car first. GO before SHOW has always been my priority.

SO here is what it comes down to, all that blah blah blah for a simple question!

Can I do anything simple, that will last another year to prevent this bare metal from rusting?

I was half-a$$ thinking about just scraping off the loose bits, doing a light sand, taping it off an spraying some primer and then touchup paint and clear coat. That way it wouldn't stick out like a sore thumb from a mile away...and it wouldn't rust?! I hope? I actually had to do this on my explorer for small patch by the rear wiper. It seemed to work fine other than my ol' lady brought home the wrong paint color...performance white instead of Oxford lol. Whatever, she has to drive it haha!

So what do you guys think?

teej281

Honestly, I dont care how fast a car is or how well it handles if it does not look respectable. i'd say repaint the whole car because he is going to have to redo the whole side of your car to make it match and might as well have a whole new fresh paint job. Then worry about the go fast/grip hard goodies. Im all for a fast car, but it has to look good too. Its just my opinion that you should have a very equal mix of go fast and look good though.

devongarver

Well...this isn't my daily driver, I have a company vehicle. I only drive this for fun. SO-prioritizing is going to be key here. I should also mention I have about 4k$ in excavating costs within the next few months to alleviate the massive drainage issue at the house/property i just bought. What I'm trying to do is find a way to keep it driveable on the weekends til next year when I can throw some more money at it.


On an odd thought/note...My soon to be wife(getting married May 5th)'s brother just painted his own car in his dad's spray booth. The dad used to have his own shop, now works for the city as a mechanic but still has all the paint equiptment and booth setup. The brother is in highschool, in a VO-ED program for autobody. I haven't seen the car, but supposedly he did a good job and the dad was impressed. Would I be nuts to let him paint it for me? All i would have to do is buy some materials and give him a few bucks im sure.

teej281

I'd do it to make it presentable until you can afford something better. Check out his grades in that school before you say yes though. And make sure he does a good job and if he doesnt, make sure he'll do it over and do it right.

devongarver

I asked my fiance, she said he is getting all A's. He seems like one of those people that just has a niche' and this is it. I will check out his car and see what it looks like before I even consider it. Of course, even if he does only an 'OK' job and there is orange peel and it flakes off in a year lol..I would still be ahead of the game. it would atleast get me through another year and Then i could afford a REAL paint job haaha.

teej281

Might also want to think about color change if you ever wanted to do it. Just saying incase you dont like your color...like me every once and a while. lol I WANT WHITE/SONIC BLUE!!!

devongarver

Haha man I have a hard enough time deciding on things....now you gotta bring up a color change..

It would be alot more work to do a full change though since then the engine bay wouldn't match either. Hmmm...