I'm a little ambitious and decided to do all my body work on my car myself. So i went and bought a stud welder to get out a dent i got in my quarter panel due to a gas station incident. So far this is where i'm at:


and this is what i started with:


Getting the main dent out was pretty easy but the corner area is prooving to be a pain. I welded a stud there, tried to take it out with the slide hammer and wripped the stud off and now there is a hole in the panel.


Anyone have any tips for me to get that part of the dent out? I was thinking maybe i should just get a welder and cut that peice off another car and put it in but i'm hoping there is an easier way.

 

Heres something that you can try without causing any more damage.

Remove the rear tire and fender well. Find a 2x4, or a crowbar wrapped in a towl, and try to ease the dent out like that.

Otherwise, just bring it to a shop and let them take care of it.

It would just save yourself alot more time and agravation.

You seem to be doing pretty good so far. Its all about practice

 

Well the main dent is out, i just gotta fix the high and low spots a little. But I need the dent on the edge that is thick metal. I can see it from behind maybe i can try and get something in that spot.

 

My dad fixes dents in cars for a living and what your doing is butchery man. Just take it to the shop and let them do it . It takes years and years of practice to take out dents in cars flawlessly, knowing from personal experiances.

 

The shop wanted $450 just for that single dent, i spent about $110 for the tools and supplies, it's not absolutely 100% perfect but it's pretty good. It came out decently. I need to do another coat of bondo and block sand some more.

 

looks good

 

The reason it'll cost you $450 at the shop is because you are paying for the job to be done right. They hopefully have plenty of experience and can make that dent disappear. You on the other hand will only improve the damaged area but the dent is still there.

I'm not trying to be a jerk, but I've learned that dent removal is an art whether it be PDR or at a body shop. I cringe now when I hear someone say, "pull it out with a plunger". If dent removal was that easy, then everyone would be doing it and it wouldn't cost $450 to look good.

 

everyone learns somehow, don't they.... unless kids just pop out knowing how to do body work....

 

I'm sure a body shop would have done a much better job, but what he did sure looks alot better than before he started. If you don't have or don't want to spend the 450 on the car I think thats certainly a better option than just leaving the dent there.

 

hey man, you did a pretty good job! looks nice but i hope you didnt lay too much bondo on there b/c you wouldnt want it 2 crack later down the road. but i think doin it yourself for 110 +labor was a hell of alot better than spendin 450 on a lousy dent!
anyways you did a good job! keep it up!

 

theoretically you shouldt aply mud till the sheet metal is within 1/8 of an inch of its original shape. unfortunately this is sometimes impossible due to metal strech. just make sure you remove all old paint with a grinder and mix your filler with the right amount and type of hardener and you shoul be alright.

 

I should of took a picture right before i applied the bondo. I worked on it some more with the stud welder and body hammer / dollies after the last non bondo picture and it looked pretty good with out the bondo.

I'll post pictures when i'm done with the complete paint job.

 

Oh man, for someone who works at a body shop, this is a federal crime man, tell me you grinded down the whole thing flat b4 you put any bondo on there, and it looks like a pankake man, you shoulda spent that 450 on the qrtr, man we get so many cars in like this, they try it, **** it up and then when we have to take the bondo off and it ends up costing more then the original estimate.

 

looks pretty good, but i see what charged is talking about. you should've grinded down metal on a much larger area than you did. it looks to me like you overlapped the bondo on the paint. i was talking to my mechanic, who is going to help me with the body work in the spring, and he was just giving me a general idea of what we have to do. he pointed out a dent, then drew a circle around it, a lot larger than the dent. he said we would have to grind down that much.

 

Yeah i grinded down all the studs flat before i applied the bondo, went and bought a grinder just for that but wound up using it for a bunch of things. I didn't know bondo shouldn't be applied over paint. The area around it was sanded but not sanded to bare metal. Maybe i should take the bondo off sand it down more and reapply it?

What do you mean buy "it looks like a pancake"?

 

You can put bondo over paint, but the paint has to be in good condition, IE: no cracking, peeling or blistering. Sand it with 80 grit, put your bondo on and work it straight, and finish your work out in 180 grit before you prime it.
Before anyone calls this method "hacking", this is actually what the big 3 manufacturers recommend now. This is done so that you don't destroy the factory undercoats and galvanizing.

 

Yeah ok, all the way to the metal, simple witha a grinder, then the metal work has to be good, the filler cannot be thicker then 1/4 inch, i never maek it thicker then that at my shop, and so does noone else.

Thats the rule, never apply bondo over paint, sanded or not, metal is the best adhesive for it. simple.

 

Just figured i'd update you guys. I redid the repair two more times after that last photo and got it pretty good. Here's a picture from today, after primer.

 

redit it twice, came out good for what u started with...i jus saw u from LI, whaere at, im in queens

 

Thanks. I'm in patchogue, in suffolk county.

 

Sweet Job Dude :hail:

 

Figured i'd update this thread one more time. I just painted it today and the area the dent was looks awesome. I touched it up after that last photo also, just more block sanding. This is with only one layer of clear, didn't have a chance to do the rest today.

 

that is freakin awesome dude :hail: