Ok, just a quick question, any thoughts would be appreciated. As has been stated in previous threads, a paintjob can be 'you get what you pay for'...I've read various times people on here getting jobs 'as good as factory' for around $3000 - $5000 dollars. So my question is this...when buying new vehicles, the cost of paint can't possibly be that much, can it..?? If our cars were brand new, right out of the factory, what do you figure it cost to paint them the very first time..? I imagine due to wholesale costs and mass production not much, and hell, this may be a dumb question...but I was just wondering.

Well around here anyway the cost of materials to do a nice factory like job is less than $1000 and that would include stripes and emblems. But if you have to do body work to even get the car ready to paint the price goes up. The largest part of what you pay for whenever you take a car to a shop for work, be it body/paint or mechanical is labor. Here shop labor runsbetween 25 and 75 dollars an hour!

Also you have to consider that at the factory the car is painted with nothing on it that has to be masked, removed, etc.

well since robots paint the cars they dont have to pay people to. and they probably buy the paint in mass qaunties, so it probably cost what a maaco job costs.

It depends on how you define "as good as factory". To lay down a paint job that flows as well, it's not terribly expensive. To paint a car in a way that you can't tell it's been repainted, that's mucho dinero.

A "good" paint job requires taking the car down to metal everywhere. That means the seats, interior, HVAC, Engine, trans, etc. needs to come out. Then everything gets blasted. Then everything gets smoothed and straightened. Then everything gets sprayed/sanded/sprayed/sanded..... Then everything gets put back together and gapped.

See where the hours start to add up?

I completely disagree. There is no need to strip a car to bare metal, even for a show-quality finish. In almost all cases, the factory baked primer/paint will adhere better to the metal than anything that you can spray out of a gun. Sanding the painted surface and painting over it will provide better adhesion than stripping it.

But... the disassembly is absolutely necessary for a finish that looks 100% "stock" or for a show-quality finish.

I agree with Jim85 IROC.

I know around here a good paint job runs you $2 000 (factory-like paint) - whatever you want. I'd say a paint job a little better than factory, if you show the car runs around $3 000 US up here (about $4 000-$4 500 Canadian) .

garett