Hey guys, as some of you might know, I had my car painted last June and I recently noticed that the paint is wrinkling or folding wherever the metal is rubbing against plastic, like the hood vent inserts, spoilers, etc. Here is a cell phone pic of the paint around the rear view mirror:



In a couple spots, the paint has come off all together, exposing the primer underneath it. However, the body shop agreed to fix those spots by touching them up with a brush and then buffing it. The guy told me I won't notice a difference. But he told me that happened because I didn't reinstall the parts properly. However I put everything on just like factory and I never noticed the original paint doing that before I took this thing apart. I noticed that it's worse when the paint is in direct sunlight.

Also, in one spot I put a pinstripe on and had to peel it off to reposition it, and some paint came off with it! Looks like it wouldn't stick to the primer, since I saw the primer under the paint that came off. The shop agreed to fix that for me.

And the paint scratches very easily, I was wiping the car off the other day and my fingernail accidentally ran across the paint very gently and it left a scratch in the clear coat.

I'm getting this stuff fixed for free now but I'm just afraid that this is a sign that my paint won't last very long. What do you think?

The $300 maaco paint on my beater seems to be holding better than this $1500 paint job; that's after I took it apart and sanded it down, then the shop just sprayed it (the $1500 paint job).

 

Tell them that you want the whole car repainted again. They didn't prep the car correctly and the paint is failing to adhere. I wouldn't let them fix the areas that need fixing. The whole car needs fixing. Because of the price, you also may have legal options if they aren't willing to fix the entire car.

 

thats just bad prep, how long ago did you paint it?

 

I will tell them that, thanks Scott!
Back in June 2010.



Any more thoughts before I take any action?

 

theres no way it should already be that bad, any paperwork from the job they did?

 

Just a generic little receipt saying that i got a $1500 paint job and i think it was dated and signed. I'm looking for it right now.

 

I hate to say it and I dont want to b "that guy" but 1500 4 them just to paint???
I have almost dubble that in matierials alone in my paint job,(and I disambled/ sanded my car 2 metal) that was 15 yrs ago!
90% of the time you get what ya pay for.
I have seen some real nice buget jobs tho.

Factory paint is much harder and thinner plus it is cured waaay better than aftermarket paint.
I work w 2 bodyshops regularly we all agree on those points.
I will say it sounds like a combination of bad prep work and putting it together 2 fast.
If your car didnt get put in a bake booth after it got painted and you started 2 put it together you will have the wrinkles because the paint hasnt had time to really cure.
I think I would strip it down and start over, maybe bad batch of primer paint or just pooie prep...

good luck to ya

 

Well here when I was looking around for quotes I could've gotten my car painted for $800 so....
Plus for that money I was told I had a good deal but I wasn't told that my paint would wrinkle up like this. The guys actually kept telling me I'd be very happen with the paint. And when I went to pick the car up the body shop guy said I was able to put it back together right away. Although I actually waited a day to do that.

Thanks for the input.

 

I agree that the paint should not be doing that. I also disagree about the car being assembled too soon. You can put a car together with the paint still wet and it will hold up fine if it was prepped right. Although I don't recommend it, lol.

 

yeah i mean its a good deal...but in the long run, you get what you pay for, most good paint jobs start at the very least 3000

most of the time for that cheap of a price they just scuff the paint and spray..never know what your gonna get

 

Long run? I was hoping that would be more than 3 months! lol

 

haha well usually it is, most macco jobs last at least a year before fading horribly

 

The funny thing is, my Jimmy got painted at Maaco in May 09 and the paint still looks decent. There's scratches and chips from off-roading and general abuse but it's actually doing pretty well for what i paid haha. And absolutely no wrinkles like my TA.

 

I honestly think i would have painted it myself, Im painting mine next month

 

Yeah $1500 doesn't sound like they used quality materials to get the job done. I got quoted $3500-4K by a local body shop that does quality work to have my car done black again

 

Lower quality materials or not, isn't a paint job supposed to look like new for more than 3 months? $1500 for paint isn't a ton but it's not exactly chump change either. Well I'm dropping the car off tomorrow, I guess I'll see how the touch ups turn out. If it starts falling apart again very soon I'll give em hell. Sounds good guys?

 

I'd like to know what kind of paint they used on your car. Synthetic enamel maybe? Be sure to ask them, get the brand and type if you can. It's seems to me the answer to your original question may be "Yes".

 

Will do!

 

My call is Bad Prep no matter what type of paint they used and you WILL notice the "touch up with a brush and buffing it"

as mention above a good paint job is 3000+ (quality materials) the only thing low quality paint and clear will do is fading sooner and clear peeling in about a year, so whe peeling is happening at 3 months and ur seeing the primer that has BAD PREP written all over.

 

Yeah makes sense. Well I just called the shop and they told me they use PPG paint. I have no idea about its quality so its up to you guys to decide. And I mentioned that the wrinkling is the result of bad prep work and all the guy told me was to bring the car in. I'm crossing my fingers here!

 

"wherever the metal is rubbing against plastic, like the hood vent inserts, spoilers, etc."
This sounds like they did not wash with good detergent and then clean / wipe down the car with wax / silicone remover before they sprayed it. All these areas would be where old wax would build up over the years.... Are you sure that they primed the entire car? Or did it just get spot primed?

 

Yeah the whole car was in primer, at least at one point. I walked in during the time it spent at the shop back in June and I snapped a couple pictures of it covered in primer/guide coat.

 

After it was block/wet sanded:

 

I have to tell you I followed your whole thread initially and reading through this makes me want to almost cry. You worked your butt off on that thing and it looked awesome. I don't have any advice or input as to why that happened as I have never painted a car but if they try to give you the runaround just remind them that you PAID for a full paint job that looked good and you want nothing less and if they give you more crap maybe you could mention that the paint job from Maaco has held up much better.

Good luck and keep us updated.

 

Thanks for the sympathy man, it kinda sucks to see it starting to fall apart after less than 1 driving season but I'll definitely fight for it. I actually dropped the car off at the shop a few hours ago, and I told them to call me with their plan before they start working on it.

I'm not gonna bash the shop too hard since the workers were very friendly and helpful when I was visiting the car during the week it was being done. Plus I watched it go through some of the steps, and they even removed the hood at one point for me because they wanted to match the inside of the fenders in the engine bay for a nicer look. They also fixed a couple dents that they noticed when blocking the car. Those are things I didn't even ask for! I doubt that they were purposely half-assing it. It was probably just a mistake, but it still ought to get fixed nonetheless.

 

From what I see here they aren't fixing anything by touching it up. I'd ask for a meeting with their PPG paint rep. Either a step was missed somewhere along the line or there may be a compatability issue with a product they used. Either way I don't think your problem is going to go away. If PPG paint was used on the car they should work for you to determine what happened. It's in their best interest. And between the paint company and the body shop you shouldn't have to do any more than say "This isn't right" and they should fix it. Of course we both know it won't be that easy... but it should be!

 

It sounds like they are nice people to deal with. As long as you can keep your cool with them (so far, so good!), everything should turn out fine.

 

"did i get screwed?"

Not if they work with you to make it right. Many things can happen. It sounds like the primer is adherring properly but the paint is not adherring to the primer. Could be incompatible products, improper prep, cleaning, other chemistry issues. These things occasionally happen even at good shops. The proof will be in how they work with you to resolve the issue. Good luck.

 

Alvanwie pretty much said what I was going to say. It definitely sounds like a compatibility issue or something to do with the prep work. They may claim to use PPG paint but that might not mean they are using their primer. Often times shops will use cheaper primer and prep products to cut costs. I truly hope that they do everything they can to make sure that your car turns out right. Brush touching and buffing will not cut it, this bird needs a good sanding and repaint!

 

compatibility issues are rulled out because is not happening to the whole car, just on places where u have to take ur time sanding.
before california went into the water borne paint, we used ppg for years, and i used it with different brand of primers PCL, Xtreme and even with a Dupont primer (customer request) and as long as the primer is properly mixed and cured before painting everything should be fine and if the primer is gonna react with the paint the "PRIMER" will be lift up on the whole car not just on some edges, and will happen as soon as the paint is being layed down not months later.

Anyways, hopefully OP gets what he was promised when he rolled the car in.

 

Well I am getting VERY frustrated with these guys. The painter keeps telling me that the wrinkles happened because I did a bad job of reinstalling the parts. OK, maybe that would be understandable if it happened in only 1 spot, but the whole car?!

He also told me that he's refusing to repaint it because of scratches on the hood that happened after it was painted. He said that whatever caused those scratches probably tweaked the entire hood to the point the plastic vents started rubbing up against the paint, causing it to wrinkle. The hood is as straight as an arrow.

I can smell the BS over the phone.

I called his boss, and he said he'll look at the car and call me tomorrow morning. What's worse is that everybody else that I talked to (except the paint rep... keep reading) is saying that it's the result of bad prep work. I even called an auto body supply store near me and they told me the same thing after I described the problem.

And turns out, they don't use PPG paint. I asked for his rep's phone number, which he gave me. I called the guy, and expecting to be talking to a PPG guy, I was surprised to be talking to someone from some other paint company. The paint rep actually stayed neutral and said that it could have been a number of different things, however of course he insisted that it wasn't the paint's fault. I didn't even care to remember the name, at least for now. I'll ask the boss tomorrow for a straight answer in terms of what paint they actually use.

And for now, I told the painter to leave the car alone. Fortunately they didn't start "touching it up" yet.

 

From what I can tell from that one blurry pic, that doesn't look like bad adhesion to me, it looks like paint that's too thick. I had a similar problem with my GTA thanks to having the gun puke halfway through my first paint job and having to respray. Rather than re-strip the car, we sanded and re-shot. The result was paint that was too thick, and shortly after I re-assembled, I had a lot of the same type of "push-up" around the tight spots.

 

I can go take pictures with a better camera and post them up. All I had was my cell phone when I took that one picture. Regardless, it's still the shop's fault if they sprayed too much on.

 

Guys, I have a very blunt question. Is it really possible for the paint to wrinkle like this (assuming the paint has been done right) if I did a poor job of installing the stuff? I just bolted everything together like you might expect from the factory.

 

I cant tell by the pic but the answer is yes but only if the paint hasnt cure, but u woild be able to tell right away but like u said it would be hard to do it to da whole car even if u tried

 

After a full day of cure time that paint should be cured enough to begin assembly. Even without being in a bake booth provided the temperature of the shop is 70 degrees or better. They screwed something up, if it had been your method of assembly, you would have scratches, even gouges if you were really careless (which I hope not) not wrinkles. Keep on 'em. Even a $1500 paint job should at least stick to the car.

 

Nah I was careful when putting this thing back together. And here are some more pictures... this time taken with a real camera.



This happened a week or so after it got painted. I spilled a little gas by mistake and went to immediately wiped it off... took some of the paint with it. Never had this happen to any other vehicle.





The pinstripe I was talking about. The bondo cracked because of my own mistake so I threw a pinstripe on there to cover the cracks. When I peeled it off to reposition it, it took the paint with it, but the primer stayed.



The trunk lid, I didn't have the keys on me to open it for a better view but you can see how the paint just totally fell off on the edge.

 

Where the spoiler rests on the quarter panel:


and some paint that came off from the wrinkling around a hood vent:

 

tell em to repaint it and this time do the prep work right ...

 

Good enough pics to reinforce my thinking.... BAD PREP. wasnt sanded propertly also, a good clear WILL stand gasoline. O have wiped stuff off a car with thiner a day two days after painted and no reaction. They should fix that up for u. That looks like a 500 dolar paintjob from maaco

 

i spray right in the driveway,base coat,clear coat,ive used dupont and cheap stuff,and after sitting 24 hrs at 80-90 degrees the paint is hard as a rock.i have done some real half *** prep and never seen anything like that.that paint and primer were not compatible.and the paint should not be soft.i bet the stoners used the wrong or not enough hardener.

the price of the job is irrelavent,the paint should stick to the car.
i would inform the shop owner that if its not fixed right that he will be dealing with a lawyer.

 

After seeing your pics, I take back my comment about the paint being too thick. This is clearly an issue of not properly sanding the surface prior to paint. Most body shops that don't take their time only hit the big surfaces with a DA and don't bother hand sanding all the nooks and crannies. Yours is peeling off so bad, I'm guessing that they also didn't bother to clean the car prior to paint.

Just make sure that when they redo it, that this crap gets removed or you'll never be any better off.

 

You said the original paint was like that? So they did not prep that paint and left all the ridges and suff in there. So it is just coming out again.

That car needed to be stripped, preped, coated and treated before paint. The problem you have is the painter low balled the price and then did not deliver quality.

Make them repaint or take legal action. The problem with the repaint they are going to do the same thing

 

lats week i got the jams in my car pianted by my father who is a painter at a body shop. i was in sumwhat of a hurry that day so he painted (ppg paint) it in the morning and let it sit for 2-3 hours appose to all day. now the paint was still soft and he told me to put the door striker on slowly so the paint didnt wrinkle and twist.... no problems there. now the paint is rock hard and loks fine. thier story is bs and they sould repaint

 

No the car's original paint (assuming you mean factory) wasn't doing that... yes there was evidence of rubbing, but the paint was 19 years old!

I'm gonna call the boss soon since it's almost noon and he hasn't called back yet... go figure.

 

First of all, If the paint adheres to the surface/primer/sealer, it isn't going to pull loose or 'twist' around the edges whenever you install the small parts. The paint on yours did not adhere because it was not prepped, nor applied properly. After seeing the pics you've posted, I have to say that I see many problems here based upon my own personal experieces, most of which were caused (in my opinion) by a body shop and it's employee(s) who either
a: Don't take pride in their work. Or,
b: Have no idea what they are doing!
I think that the painter did a really LESS than Half-assed job and he probably sniffed half of the clear that sould have been sprayed on the car!
I see base coat that is Too thick in some places, and clear coat that is WAY too thin in others (like where the pinstripe took the paint off). I think that they most likely just sprayed the base coat over the car the way you handed it over to them, without sanding or wiping all the nooks and crannies of the car down with a silicone remover. They also should have covered the entire car with a sealer of some sort before the paint went on. I don't think they did. As for the paint being soft; Base/clear hardens/cures through a CHEMICAL REACTION, within a certain number of hours after being 'activated' with an activator which is mixed in with the clear using a specific ratio of clear:activator. Warmer temperatures will speed up the reaction, therefore, baking the paint in a booth only SPEEDS UP the curing process. It doesn't really make the paint any harder, just makes it cure sooner. If the clear is too soft it is a matter of either the ratio of clear/activator not being correct, or the two were not compatible, I.E. clear is one brand, activator is some other brand and they were not formulated to be mixed together.....I think they owe you a NICE paint job,... or a refund.
John C.

 

Thanks man, despite everybody telling me that the body shop simply won't take responsibility. I went to the shop yesterday with my parents to talk to the owner in person (who by the way refused to speak to me over the phone, thinking that my paint job didn't matter). He's been rattling on and on about how he's not to blame. He even told me that the right way to paint a car is with it being assembled!!!!! I should've asked why there was an old Dodge Charger shell (almost completely disassembled) freshly painted right in front of the damn shop. However he "promises" that it won't get any worse and if paint does start f'in up on the main surfaces, he'll repaint those parts.

I took the car back without letting them touch it, so I can run around and get some opinions written on paper by people who saw it in person. Anybody in the CT area wanna see my car?

 

Bad prep I took autobody for 3 years, if you dont scuff the edges they peel. As far as by the gas tank they did one of two things, didnt put the clearcoat on thick enough or burned through the clear coat when they were buffing it.

File a complaint with the bbb so its on there permanent record.


How much did you pay to get it painted?

As far as the spoiler, if the bolts arent tight or if its warped it will rattle and scuff, not really there fault.


The other is and by the gas tank.


A good body shop can fix it, i would drive it and enjoy it for 6 months if it gets worse you may b looking at a redo over all the edges.



Matt

 

I wrote $1500 earlier. And the spoiler is on pretty firmly, and the paint wrinkled and came off completely... it didn't just get scuffed.

 

Stielow775's comment about the Better Business Bureau might not be a bad idea. I know that when stuff does happen to go wrong at the shop I work at, we take care of it before we let it roll out the door. That's just good work ethic. Anyways, depending on how far you want to pursue this, legal action might be the way to go my friend. If you can't get anywhere with that, just remember, word of mouth goes a long way.