Dent repair on the XC90 door
 

All, my XC90's front passenger side door (near the handle) sustained some damage - a dent, in a car park. I'm sure some inconsiderate idiot must have opened their car door and hit mine.

I have a dent/scratch insurance policy (Smart repair) and am claiming on it.

The guy from the repair company called. He'll do the repair at my place. He said, he'll use a filler to fix the dent and respray the door.

I am not sure if he'll respray just the affected area or the whole door.

I am concerned if that's the correct way (filler + spray) do it or if there's a better way. I have no knowledge in this area.

Any insights are appreciated. Any gotchas to watch out for?

Please advise.

If the paint isn’t broken i’d opt for PDR (paintless dent removal) the guys are genius....I had a small ping dent and a guy worked his magic, invisible, gone, nada!

Thank you, there is paint damage. Picture attached.

Are you sure that is not white paint from the usual suspect white van mans van who did it, if it is it can easily be removed with thinners before repair.

I had similar dings repaired by a mobile painless dent repair chap.
Volvo dealer told me it would cost me £500 for the dent repair and repainting of the door, feathering it in to the neighbouring panels.
Utter tosh.
The PDR chap did an amazing job, and with some polish fixed the "damaged" paint which was in the dent.
Cost £40.
Go for the painless dent repair.

If the paint isn't broken then a paintless dent repair would be the best bet. If however a respray is needed I would caution against this route. I had a nightmare experience of a quick repair using Autoglass Body Repair, they messed up the repair by using the wrong paint (my car was pearlescent metallic) their paint wasn't , and I ended up having to have the side of the car professionally resprayed to undo the damage they caused! On reflection expecting a factory standard finish from a repair undertaken in a tent on my driveway, rather than a professional spray booth, was unrealistic. Of course YMMV, and if its a lease car that you plan on chopping in, rather than a purchase you intend to keep, then its likely less of an issue.

Thank you all for your prompt and helpful responses.

The SMART repair guy attended the car today, and I brought up PDR. He then agreed that PDR would be a better option in this case.

As one of you said, its just the paint from the other car I think, and he easily removed the scratches by polishing.

The dent repair insurance company has now arranged an appointment with a company specialising in PDR, to get the dent removed.

Thanks once again, and I'll post an update in a week's time.

An update:

Happy ending :regular_smile:

The PDR guy turned up today. He wanted to insert a metal rod behind the door panel, to push out the dent. But as I have laminated glass there was no room for that.

He then used the glue pull mechanism to pull the dent out.

Amazing job, well pleased.

Glad to hear, these guys are very good, well the ones that stay in the business are!

S

Someone sent me a PM, asking about the dent repair company. I am not allowed to reply to PMs on this site yet.

My dent was fixed by Darren from http://www.fix-my-dent.co.uk