Quote: Originally posted by Gunny Highway I took that pic in November so it's been a year since the car was painted. It was waxed about 5 months prior to that picture being taken as well. . . and thanks man. Is it base/clear? Do you happen to have any pics of under the hood? What did you do with the engine bay since it was a color change?

When I did the motor swap (LO3 --> 350 TBI with cam, aluminum heads etc) prior to the paint job, I painted the engine bay semi-gloss black (matches the headlight buckets and glass trim). It looks real good. . . you know how they say black goes with anything right?

...yup, black goes with anything!......even hot pink and lime green lol

Their isnt much that can go wrong with a paint job, but. Maaco washes it and maybe scuffs it around the edges. They use lower quality paints in single stage meaning if you want to fix the paint and it is mettalic you will cut the mettalic and dull it. They usually tape very little and just shoot the whole car. I have done a few paint jobs through places like maaco on racecars and daily drivers but I do all the body work priming blocking dissasembly and final sanding myself before sending over, and they do turn out good. For some reason that cheap acrylic ureathane shines so much more than a fresh bc/cc setup. Bottom line is that body shop rates here range from65 to 75 per hour and you get what you pay for.

what do u guys think a dealership body shop would charge for my car? outrageously more expensive? do they use better quality paint?

Definately. Good paint, like a ppg base coat clear coat, will run about 150 to 300 a sprayable gallon depending on color. Clear coat runs about 300 dollars a sprayable gallon. Body shop rates here in northern cali run about 68 an hour. Some shops figure paint cost as half the hourly paint time. So if you have 20 hours of body work including removal and installation of all components, door handles weather strip, and the actually dent repair, and lets say 10 hours paint time including priming and blocking any repair areas, Then you would figure;
20 hrs body labor x 65.00/hr..........1300.00
10 hrs paint labor x 65.00/hr.......... 650.00
10 hrs x 32.50 for paint materials...325.00
total = 2275.00
Of coarse the quality and longevity of this job would be much greater. And this is a low estimate, its worth talking to a body shop estimator, they will sometime give breaks for cash deals.

What color is that? Do you have a number?