Nightmare Repairs - Help

[XC60Owner]

Ok so wife dented rear wing and scratched rear door in car park. Insurance claim made. Repairs done in Volvo garage. Got home and discovered white marks down tip of door. Returned to garage. Garage says due to overpolishing and resprayed door again. Now rear door is noticeably darker than front door (although bizarrely matches rear wing). Argghh! They are saying to respray front door now but there was no damage to that door.

My Questions

how good should a respray be? garage says you will always be able to tell because of lacquer (sp?). But I couldn't tell the first time (I think actually they only partly resprayed rear door originally which is why I couldn't tell - damage was only at bottom of door)

I don't want front door resprayed, am thinking can they not start again with rear door?

Is it normal to get blend marks? I could see a very faint light patch where old and new paint blended on rear door (Saville Grey) before it was entirely repainted - I don't want these marks on front door.

Whole thing is driving me mad (there have been other issues that have now been resolve - like damaged leather during repair).

[ADP]

They have to blend paint in somehow, so its probably never going to be perfect - someone who knows what they are looking for will always be able to spot it but the man on the street wont. Just make sure they dont let any orange peel into the paint because that stands out a mile!

[AB-UK]

Had my first door ding after 3 years of careful parking - I was furious. (it wasn't large and was caused by a woman opening her door too wide - didn't actually see it done unfortunately).
Took it to Volvo dealer - quoted £500 because he said the whole side of the car had to be re-sprayed in order to feather in the resprayed door.
Decided to wait until I collected a few more. I did collect another one so ....

Just had both dings removed by a paintless repair outfit - £40 for an amazing job.

If the damage to your car included removal of paint, then respraying is I suppose inevitable - but the "feathering in" accounts for the cost.

[xc90paddy]

how good should a respray be?
Respray should be 100% or as dam near as makes no difference. It should definetly be good enough that to the untrained eye it is not noticeable. Two things - paint colour on a car does change with age thus if its a fairly new car paint should be easily matched and if its a volvo then the volvo dealer should have the exact match!


garage says you will always be able to tell because of lacquer (sp?). Bollocks

But I couldn't tell the first time (I think actually they only partly resprayed rear door originally which is why I couldn't tell - damage was only at bottom of door)
No panels on a car are completely flat thus the daylight reflection on the car is different across say a door panel. Usually if panels have to be partially sprayed they would spray a flat section up to a fold line in the panels or to a bit of trim or something which would maan that any slight differences in paint colour would be noticed due to the varying reflection of the daylight. Sounds like they just 'blew in' a small area on your car which is the cheapest way to make any repair.

I don't want front door resprayed, am thinking can they not start again with rear door?
Don't get the front door done sounds like there's a mismatch of colour and you could just move this to between front wing and door etc.

Is it normal to get blend marks?
As said above they should paint up to use any fold lines in trim in the panels to avoid such things being noticeable

Only thing is that metallic colours are more difficult to match and especially silver based colours.

[XC60Owner]

Originally Posted by xc90paddy

[COLOR="RoyalBlue"]

I don't want front door resprayed, am thinking can they not start again with rear door?
Don't get the front door done sounds like there's a mismatch of colour and you could just move this to between front wing and door etc.

Exactly my fear. What can I do? I can't move garages because insurance company say now job has been started at this garage it must be completed there. They of course claim they are using the correct paint and it is just the lacquer making the car look darker. How can I ensure they are using the correct paint?

[Blue 8]

IT SHOULD BE 100%

I had a wing painted on my BMW a few years back and it was not as good as i would of liked but i did not notice this until i got it home, the car was white and the paint looked a different shade, the bookshop that did the repair said tough basically as did my insurers (i wont bore you with details) i lived with this for about a year until i got so fed up i ran it down to a little back street bodyshop and showed them, i was told there is no excuse for poor mis match of paint colour of blending, i took a chance and let this guy have my car (remember this was a shabby back street place) he had the car for two days and this time when i picked the car up i was over the top when checking it out, but it was a first class job , in fact you could not tell that any paint work had been done to the car at all.

The point Im trying to make is don't let them tell you this poor work has to be expected it doesn't
Andy

[xc90paddy]

Originally Posted by xc90paddy

But I couldn't tell the first time (I think actually they only partly resprayed rear door originally which is why I couldn't tell - damage was only at bottom of door)
No panels on a car are completely flat thus the daylight reflection on the car is different across say a door panel. Usually if panels have to be partially sprayed they would spray a flat section up to a fold line in the panels or to a bit of trim or something which would mean that any slight differences in paint colour would NOT be noticed due to the varying reflection of the daylight.

sorry some typos in my previous post, now corrected

[4 forty]

Originally Posted by Blue 8

IT SHOULD BE 100%

I had a wing painted on my BMW a few years back and it was not as good as i would of liked but i did not notice this until i got it home, the car was white and the paint looked a different shade, the bookshop that did the repair said tough basically as did my insurers (i wont bore you with details) i lived with this for about a year until i got so fed up i ran it down to a little back street bodyshop and showed them, i was told there is no excuse for poor mis match of paint colour of blending, i took a chance and let this guy have my car (remember this was a shabby back street place) he had the car for two days and this time when i picked the car up i was over the top when checking it out, but it was a first class job , in fact you could not tell that any paint work had been done to the car at all.

The point Im trying to make is don't let them tell you this poor work has to be expected it doesn't
Andy

and people ridicule back street garages, who can do as good, if not a better job than a main dealer.

[2.4TSE]

When my parked pearlescent red V70 was damaged when just a few weeks old by a neighbour on his bicycle* the fuel flap needed repainting but not the surrounding panel. The body shop did a superb job and under any lighting condition the colour match is perfect to the human eye. The only way I can tell that the repair has been done is under intense evening sunlight when it becomes possible to detect polishing bonnet swirls.

For the record and assuming it still applies to your XC60, don't forget how to decode Volvo paint codes and give your body shop the best chance of using a paint supply that will give the resultant mix the best chance of matching:

http://www.volvoclub.org.uk/paint_colour_codes.shtml

Given the newness of your car and absence of colour fade I would hope your result be as good as mine was.


*summary of conversation between New Money mother and nipper who went from "Not me, Mum" to admitting full responsiblity in the space of a short walk from his front door to my car: "You're lucky it's only a Volvo and not a Mercedes like ours....", as if that has the slightest thing to do with body shop repairs let alone the small matter that Volvo labour rates tend to be at the stiff end.

[XC60Owner]

Well I'm glad I persisted. Car has come back from garage and this time it is absolutely perfect Garage were very helpful (and apologetic). I almost settled for not quite right (first time round) then regretted not doing so when it came back worse (second time round) but thrid and final time it is spot on. Phew! What a relief.