I need help, a body shop ruined my paint (06 Civic)

L

lostdaytomorrow

New member
Hello folks, I've been into detailing since I got this car (August 06), and I've taken very good care of it. A woman dented my fender on a windy day in a parking lot by opening her door too fast. I took it to have an estimate made to get the dent out at a Honda approved body shop. While I was there, the guy seemed really nice so I told him to get me an estimate on some other nicks I had on my driver's side door while I was there. He promptly asked me for my keys to go take it to the back and have his guys take a look at it (never said he was even going to touch it). I obliged and let him take it around back (this place has a huge area in the back that could hold at least 20-25 cars inside a huge garage).



He then comes back to me and says he removed the scratches with no problems (he didn't get all of them though, at first I thought, "awesome").



My car wasn't clean when I took it in because it's been raining on and off quite a bit the past week or two, so I finally went and washed it on Saturday. This is what I find when I finish drying it...



http://i35.photobucket.com/albums/d166/Chronicdrummer9/Marring3.jpg

http://i35.photobucket.com/albums/d166/Chronicdrummer9/Marring.jpg

http://i35.photobucket.com/albums/d166/Chronicdrummer9/Marring2.jpg



And this is definitely not the camera playing tricks, the door was 100% clear of marring and/or swirling when I last washed it.



He did this for "free" because he knew I would be coming back and getting the dent popped out (which I won't be doing anymore from him). I am obviously driving up there tomorrow morning and asking what in the world happened to my car. I was curious and asked him what polish he used and he mentioned it was a commerical 3M product he gets from a local auto paint store.



Please let me know what I should do, and if I should even let him try and fix it or just take it to another place and let them fix it for me.



Thanks for reading.





Cliffs: My car's paint is messed up because of a dumb shop which didn't have my permission to even touch my car. Help.
 
Kind of hard to tell from those shots, just looks like some compound hazing, I would think that would come out. Consensus seems to be that body shops don't know anything about detailing, so I'm not surprised, and you may not find any that are better.
 
Assuming it is just hazing, which it really doesn't look like in person if the hazing you are referring to looks anything like wax hazing... How would you recommend I get it out? It is also like this on the front fender where I have the ding in my door, and is extremely noticeable on the lines of the car. It was tough to get shots without the sun glaring off the other parts of the car.
 
It's kind of hard to tell, of course, start with the least aggressive technique that gets the job done. Do you think they took off a lot of clear? If not, try a medium polish like #83 or OC or SSR2.5 on an orange pad, then go a little finer, #80 or OP on a polishing pad.
 
It looks to me like they "burned" the entire clear off of my paint, no joke. I ran the MF towel over it plenty of times, and nothing changed at all, just making sure it wasn't haze. I've never actually used polish before, because I've only waxed it once and didn't think I was going to need to polish it until I want to put on the 2nd coat of wax for the spring. I've clayed it 4-5 times and wash it at least 1x/week though.



I don't know what a medium polish like #83 is (i assume it's meguiar's due to the numbering scheme), also, I have no clue what the orange pad is either...



Thanks for your prompt help Setec.
 
Haze is damage to the paint. You're going to need a machine to correct that, or a LOT of elbow grease. I don't really think it's as bad as you're worried it is.
 
Setec Astronomy said:
You're going to need a machine to correct that, or a LOT of elbow grease.
Click to expand...





agreed, use the least aggressive method and move up as needed...



Marring.jpg
 
3M Rubbing compound maybe? It's the product "regular" people throw around as a cure-all for all scratches...



"d00d you gotta check this mang, it got sum scratches outta mah door!11~~"



:rolleyes:
 
I'm in TX out in the boonies pretty much, I'll be taking it in tomorrow and letting them know it needs to be fixed, and if he's a jerk about it, I'll do it myself.
 
paul34 said:
3M Rubbing compound maybe? It's the product "regular" people throw around as a cure-all for all scratches...



"d00d you gotta check this mang, it got sum scratches outta mah door!11~~"



:rolleyes:
Click to expand...

Yes, that actually is what he said I think. I'm more mad about him doing this to my car, then the fact that I have to fix it.



Also, where might I find this orange pad and also a place that teaches me how to hand-polish using the compounds mentioned above?
 
A decent detailer should polish that out within 10 minutes. It's compounding haze, likely the culprit of a wool pad, a compound, and an aggressive buffer jocky. :waxing:



Realistically it's nothing serious, just find someone local who is on here and knows what they are doing. :)
 
By your responses to the polish and pad replies, I assume you haven't ever polished your car with a machine before. I think when you hear the word "hazing" it sounds like you are thinking of the residue left after applying wax, but that is not what the others were talking about. The hazing that the others have talked about is what is left after polishing with an aggressive polish. Think of it like doing wet sanding. Using an aggressive polish is like using a coarse sand paper. To take out the scratches the body shop guy most likely used an aggressive polish. But now the polish has left very tiny scratches in the paint giving it the "hazy" look. Now you just need to hit the spots with a fine polish to remove the tiny scratches to get it back to the nice finish you have on the rest of the car.
 
Lostday, Where are you in Tx? You might post this in the local section. There may be someone near you or in driving distance that can help you out.
 
Well I took it back into him today, and they did a decent job of getting it fixed, but it's still not near what I want it to look like (the rest of the car). I'll be researching hand polishing techniques and ordering some products this week to get this taken care of. I'm from the north Dallas area.



He told me they used 1500 grit on friday when they made that haze and he didn't tell me what they did today but I figure they just used a finer paper and some not so harsh compound on it . It looks better, but still not like the rest of the car. It only took them about two minutes to "fix" it, too...



So now that the major hazing is gone, should I still be looking into the same products (#83, SSR, and those type of polishes)?
 
It will still probably be a lot of work to fix that by hand. I think north Dallas probably has a number of Autopians, so I second the suggestion to post in the regional forum and find someone to fix it for you, or take the plunge and get one of those closeout PC's from Lowe's for cheap and do it yourself.
 
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