i have an 86 z28..i have just finished a 4 yr stretch of engine and trany swaps and fixin the the body, from mild rust and dents...however the past four yrs has left me with a huge whole in the pocket, not leaving alot to paint the car...



with this said, would anyone trust MACCO to paint their car...

ive got about 600 to spend on the paint, and MACCO has said they could do it....they do have to prep the car a bit, and apply a layer of apoxy primer, and of corse the paint....

if anyone had had their car painted at one of their locations could u please post pictures so that i may be able to get a feel for quality, and of corse any comments that you have...

 

had mine painted at maaco last may, my brother had his 86 Firebird painted there a few years ago and it turned out great. we did all the body work ourselves though....so i can't judge maacos work on that aspect but i have no complaints about the paint i even got a 3 year warranty.

 

DO NOT GO TO MACCO!!!!!!!!!!!!!! theyre paint jobs are the worst thing you can do to your car. zero prep work is done to it the paint wont stick, it wont be shinny, trash wont get buffed out, etc etc save your cash till you can afford a decent job. go ask around body shops many painters do side work ask them how much theyd charge you.

 

yeah my car doesn't shine whatsoever

 

I had my car painted at maaco..........over two years ago. Sorry i do not have pics but it is bright and shiny as hell. Ran me 600 bucks. It is still holding up fine. Who knows, maybe i got lucky.

 

Maaco....Maaco...Gawd, if I could only go back a few months ago and stopped myself from ever letting them touch my car I would be a much happier person (and it's be a BIG money saving thing too...Not having to stip all their crap paint off) Let's just put it this way....You push your rear bumper in, and the paint falls off. I mean literally falls off, in HUGE flakes. I drove it in the snow, and it looked like a fricken dalmation. All the yellow paint just flaked off from all over the front bumper and GFX, and shown through black. I mean, come on...It's snow. Snow shouldn't be pulling paint off!? Ok...I'm done my ranting. You do what you want...



OH YEAH: I did all the bodywork myself. The car was flawless when I took it in there...

 

I know this may sound strange, but you could paint it yourself. That way you'd learn and you would have control over the quality control. If you screw it up, just sand it off and start over. It's a pita, but you could do it for about $250.00 if the bodywork is already done.

 

I know Macco really sucks. The reason your paint is flaking off is because those idoits are probably too stupid to realize that there is a seperate primer that you use for plastic. It will never grab the plastic without it. You probably already knew that though.. Sry to hear about the unfortunate problem.

Z28 Crazy - Definitely save your money! If you were in the Ohio area i'd suggest bringing it to my family's body shop, but i see you are in NY. It really depends how good you want the car to look. A really great shine takes a lot of wet sanding on the primer if want it to be deep. 4 years of work isn't worth the risk of having a crappy paint job. If you are like me, you want something that will really make you proud

 

this topic has come up alot, and it seems it depends on the work done at that certain location, the one around my house seems to do good work.

 

Thanks for the sympathy

Another thing,
Your best bet would be to find someone local who either owns a very small bodyshop, or is just known to do bodywork on the side. You know what I'm talking about, every town's got 'em
In my experience, they're the one's who tend to do the best job (as good as their skills let them) because they have the most to lose if you're not happy with their work:
A) They probably need the money and want to get it right the first time and not have to pay if you don't like it
B) You are their MAIN form of advertising. Everyone knows that if you're happy, you're gonna tell your friends. If you complain, word of mouth spreads fast, and well...he won't be too happy.

Anyways, you get the idea. Just do a little investigation first, they'll usually be more than happy to show you the booth and cars they've worked/are working on. The guys that do it for a hobby are the guys that love it and are passionate about it

(Oh, by the way...This whole post was about a CHEAP paint job. Obviously, a $3,000 paint job will never compare)

 

It is a gamble... do you want to risk it? Or would you rather pay a little more and make sure the job is done right?

 

ive had 2 cars painted at macco and both turned out great. But as it was already said, everyone is differant. Each is independantly owned and operated. Check out the people there watch them do some work, and check out the cars they have out in their parking lot

 

very true it all depends on the factors of who does it, whether or not they can paint good which doesnt effect it to badly because it can be wet sanded w/ fine grit paper and buffed to remove dirt, small runs and imperfections and dull spots

but the biggest thiong that afects paintjobs is the paint u get what u pay for!!! u buy cheap junk like 50 or less a gallon itll never work itl shine at 1st but then fade change colors turn dull its just pure junk.
but if they get good quality paint then it be just fine round here 600 is more then enough to buy yur own paint and gun and be able to do it yur self but i do understand it is tough doin it when u havent ever very easy to get runs or dry spots.
definately depends on the shops quality of paint and who does it .
id find pics or go see cars theyve done before or find local small body shop n inspect their previous cars alot of places has pics of ones theyve done or could tell u how to find some.

 

well im takin my other camaro to maaco.....and they do a good job......and to tell u the truth......they can do a good job.....but if you want their **** package deal that you see on tv or whats called their basic paint........then you will get a crap job for cheap money.....or you can go with thier more exspensive package and you will find yourself pleased with the paint. for the body work i dont really know but im getting body work done there so ill let you know how that turns out.

 

Dont take it to macoo. just dont. My old 91 RS was maccood into a viper blue...nasty.

But here is the catch, i work at a body shop, guess where, in NY, where in queens, so if you do all the body work, prime it and bring it in, i think i cna work sumthing out with you, but save up some more money, remeove the mirrors all trim and what not...depends how good of a job you want, thats how much its gonna cost.

 

yup, like I said, when you push the front bumper cover in, and the paint falls off, something's very very wrong...

 

I had Maaco paint my Firebird. They did an excellent job on the body work considering the dents, sagging doors, and crooked hood that it had before I got the work done. As for the paint, I was happy at first. There were spots where the paint was thin, and after the impurities worked out of the paint, the paint looked dull. When I took it back and pointed out their mistakes, they could not find anything wrong. Do yourself a favor: Save your money and get it painted somewhere else. Its worth the wait.

 

It all depends on the independant shop. I had my old 85 painted there, and it looked awesome for the first 6 months. After that, the paint faded, changed color shade, and chipped off in huge chunks. We had the car repainted as warranty work shortly after, and it went to crap one month after the warranty went up.

Moral of the story: Research the shop before you let them touch your pride and joy.

 

Charged, i am looking for a good, not too expensive body shop in NYC. How is your shop?

 

I had macco paint my car, while the paint looks good, they did manage to paint my weatherstriping, actually painted the weatherstripping that surrounds the windscreen, the metal trim on my rear hatch, and the GFX. other then that it hasnt flaked or peeled yet and its 4yrs old, and it sees as much sun as palo verde tree. oh believe me white paint on w/striping looks like ****

 

As a painter myself, dont, for the sake fo the car dont, its garbage what they do, insane, dont do it,.,.

 

I'm probably going to have to strip my bumpers off and repaint them myself. I have no idea where the prior owners took the car, but the paint just isn't holding to them.

Whatever it was, it was a pretty cheap job (although I don't think gradient two-tone jobs are especially cheap, it's just the way it was done...)

 

What you definitly get is that some maccos do a fairly good job for the money and some do an asboltuy terrible one, i guess its largely up to the kid whos getting paid 10 bucks an hour to paint your car.

The reason i would never go to macco is ive seen people on this board make a list of all the things that need to be done to paint a car properly and the basic fact that theres no way to accomplish all those things for less then 2000 dollars so somethings got to give. But im also the sort of person where if there is one little imperfection it will drive me nuts so having a 600 dollar paint job on my car would make me want to cry every time i looked at it

 

the only way that i was goig to take my car to them was if i did all teh prep work myself...i know that they do **** work. I am glad i took my car somewhere else b/c it turned out great they fixed all the dents and filled some small dings. i only paid 900 for it and i dont think that i could be happier

 

It all depends on how your local Maaco is...The one in downtown Richmond seems to be pretty sucky with their work, But my cousin in Southside got his done and it turned out awesome...And thats less then an hour apart! I guess if you can see some cars done @ your local Maaco before you decide thats your best bet...I just painted mine myself...First time trying and I spent under $300 on everything including prep!

 

If it where me I would wet sand the car myself with 1000 grit and like fyrechikyn said there are guys who work on the side just like me you could have it taped and sprayed for around $200 bucks