Poor taping job prior to paint two tone bumper- safe way to correct?

L

Lust4Lexus

New member
My wife's 2011 cpo rx 350 had its rear bumper resprayed by the dealer after delivery due to mickey mouse touch up attempts. The bumper has a flat black plastic underbelly which is not removable from the part of the bumper that gets painted. It's all one piece. Therefore a good eye when taping is needed.


The painter did not have a good eye and wound up taping 1/2 to 1 millimeter to low, therefore painting a small sliver of the actual black plastic molding...this now makes it obvious that the bumper was resprayed, if you inspect it closely, and of course I look for it all the time. The average person however would probably not notice it or care. But autopians are not average people.....


Taking it back to dealer is not an option... Besides- I don't trust them to do the job right. I would like to safely attack this left over line of paint, but I'm nervous about making the issue worse.. I would flip out. Lol.


I was planing on taping with am eagle eye and then somehow remove the fine line of paint.... I tried a small area with alcohol and a q tip.....nothing..... A razor blade proved to work, but cracked and chizzled the paint and did not leave a smooth enough edge to make me want to continue..what could I use to dissolve the paint without potentially hurting the black plastic finish? I don't want to open a can of worms, but if there is an easy, safe answer, I will try it..


It's not a huge deal, but you guys are the only ones that can relate to my "issue"


Thanks!
 
Lust4Lexus- You're not gonna like my take on this.....


 


I have the same kind of two-tone effects on my Audis (all of which have had paintwork done on those areas).


 


Sometimes the black portion is *NOT* black plastic, but rather a black "paint" (scare-quotes as sometimes it's normal paint, but sometimes it's weird stuff, they come that way prior to being painted in the normal sense) with yellowish plastic under it.  So you need to be a little careful about using a solvent that'll dissolve paint; don't want to mess up the black part.


 


Besides that, the issue with fixing the mis-masked line is that you need the right kind of "edge" in the sense of the basecoat/clearcoat layers and it'll be tough to achieve that if you just "strip it back".  If it doesn't go well you'll be dealing with serious paint failure in short order.


 


SO yeah, you're looking at opening a can of worms and the whole idea makes me nervous.


 


I can't help but wonder if they otherwise did the job right, as that's a pretty awful mistake.  They *did* paint the bumpercover off the car and then install it, right?!?  This is *VERY* important, it *must* be done that way or it'll chip/peel/fail.


 


Eh, there's the part you won't like- I'd take it to a decent paint shop and have it redone.  *MAYBE* they can do some kind of spot-repair, but I'd go with whatever they want to do.  And I'd hold them to doing an acceptable job.  I realize that this stuff seldom turns out 100% perfect; most of my vehicles have issues I've learned to live with.  But this one I simply could *not* accept.  But hey, that's just me.
 
I will leave it alone. In the event that it does fail, I will hold the Lexus dealer accountable, after all, it was done by them, or it was farmed out to a place, and it has Lexus' face on it. I honestly doubt they paid for the removal of the bumper to repaint it.... Im not putting any money into that bumper. If it fails- the Lexus dealer will have to take care of it, and I'll hold them to doing a proper job. I just have too much going on right now to add more aggravation to my schedule, lol. The situation does piss me off though.


Thanks for your candor.
 
Basically to put it to you quite frankly......they destroyed your bumper cover. Chances are you will never be able to perfectly remove/straighten out the bad edging job without destroying the unpainted surface underneath. Either live with it or pitch a major $^#^& with them. 
 
I just contacted the service manager at the dealer, and he said that he will have the shop "redo" it when I come in for my first service.  You guys are right- why should I have to accept it? They are Lexus- It should be perfect. Let them do whatever it takes to get it done right- They are not some guy selling cars out of a trailer for crying out loud! I will get into the particulars with him when I drop it off for my first service. Obviously Im not accepting anything less then a perfect looking bumper cover once it comes back so we will see what happens. I sent him a pic and created an email thread.  I will express my concerns on upholding a proper job when I see him. He was apologetic. I think he understands now that I'm one "those kinds of customers" now. Thanks guys for your help. Feeling better now! :) Here is a pic of the bumper cover. 


 


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Yeah, they botched the fine line tape job. Me being an Insurance Adjuster I have no problem paying a shop extra time to take the extra step at making these repairs/refinishes come out properly. It's just up to them to do the right thing. Chances are that the dealer didn't express the same concern and this is what happens. If possible, try not to put this off for too long. They may be hoping that you'll cool down a bunch and forget about it. Be proactive in closing this out. 


 


Thanks for sharing this with Autopia and please keep us posted on the outcome. 
 
Hahaha! Trust me- I won't forget... There is a whole prequel to this story. Way to big to get into... He WILL make it right.
 
Lust4Lexus- Hey, I'm very happy to hear about your decision to pursue this!


 


When you discuss it with them, *insist* that the cover be painted off the car.  The issue in question is called "bridging", as in, if they leave it on the car, no matter how careful they are there will be places where the new paint gets between the cover and the adjacent panels...it "bridges the gap" and that sets it up for failure becasue as the panels move/vibrate/etc. that paint joining the two panels will crack.  Bodyshops know about this...painting on-the-car is simply shoddy work of the Earl Scheib variety, decent shops *always* remove such pieces to paint them...*ALWAYS*, so don't let them BS you.  Heh heh, one thing such shops fear is an informed customer, so go ahead and mention the fear of bridging; it'll let them know that you're somebody they need to take seriously.
 
Any update to the situation? I have a similar problem on my repainted 2-tone bumper. The masking job was sub-par and theres even an uneven part in the area where the line is straight so it looks like a little heart beat monitor. My temporary fix is a red-pinstriping across that whole section to cover it up.

The shop I took it to said they can manipulate the tape line and fix it with some type of solvent (not paint thinner/stripper). All they had to do was re-tape it off and apply the solvent and they could clean it up. They seemed very confident that they could accomplish this, but sounds a little fishy and could get worse than what I already have.

Im curious what your dealer's shop did to fix this problem. How did it go? Any pics?


Lust4Lexus said:
I just contacted the service manager at the dealer, and he said that he will have the shop "redo" it when I come in for my first service. xYou guys are right- why should I have to accept it? They are Lexus- It should be perfect. Let them do whatever it takes to get it done right- They are not some guy selling cars out of a trailer for crying out loud! I will get into the particulars with him when I drop it off for my first service. Obviously Im not accepting anything less then a perfect looking bumper cover once it comes back so we will see what happens. I sent him a pic and created an email thread. xI will express my concerns on upholding a proper job when I see him. He was apologetic. I think he understands now that I'm one "those kinds of customers" now. Thanks guys for your help. Feeling better now! :)xHere is a pic of the bumper cover.x


x
Click to expand...
 
H15A- Welcome to Autopia!

I dunno if Lust4Lexus is still active here, and I don't recall his having gotten back about how it turned out.

That shop's explanation sounds more than fishy to me, really sets off my BS meter. The problem is in the *basecoat* which is under the clearcoat (I *am* @$$uming it's b/c paint like 99.9% of the cars out there) so there's simply no way any "solvent" can fix it. How can they get under the clearcoat to change something related to the basecoat, and do it without messing up that clearcoat?!?

The solution to stuff like this is to simply:
-Remove bumpercover
-Strip off existing paint
-Repaint properly
-Reinstall bumpercover

That's it, period IMO. Otherwise I'd just live with it as opposed to letting some [individual] mess around with a BS "fix".
 
Lust4Lexus -
Welcome to the Forum -

Sorry that Lexus messed your bumper up..

Another solution which would have perhaps worked would be to tape off the Silver portion of the bumper and carefully spray the overspray silver black again..
It would require getting the exact color from the Dealer or one that may be already sold via Dupli-Color, etc., at the auto parts store..

But since the Dealer is going to do it over, let's see what they come up with...
If they cant remove the silver safely off the black portion, then they will probably do what I just suggested,, :)

Good luck with this !
Dan F
 
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