im seriously thinking about repaining it...theres a couple dents in the hood (not a ding, but like someone pushed the panel in, not hard to get fixed) which bothers me, and when my dad owned my MINI, someone hit the door with a cart or something....cant see it when the car is dirty, but when its all clean, you see it like crazy!

and the back....horrible...the bumper has scuff marks..etc.

the hood has swirls too..


and im sure its common with the paint from the factory, but the orange peel in the clear coat, especially on the doors is horrible.

plus, i want to get the arches painted, door handles, headlight rings, grille, gas cap, etc.

 

Keep in mind though, that repainting a car in order to rectify minor cosmetic blemishes can have a negative impact on your resale value. An used car appraiser can easily feel/see a car that has been repainted aftermarket and assume it has had accident repair.

If you have dings and dents and the paint is not broken or damaged, you have better alternatives to full body shop work. Paintless Dent Removal is the ticket. Check out www.dentwizard.com.

Fast, reasonable cost and undetectable repairs. PDR can help maintain and increase your car's value.

If you are in SoCal, I would get in touch with NAM poster OctaneGuy and let him see the car for a professional opinion. Richard Lin (Octaneguy) is a professional car detailer and probably he can better guide you through what can be done to spiff up the car and what to do about the rest of the blemishes.

If you must re-spray, I would limit that task to just the bumper covers.

I am just trying to help you save money by approaching the situation from a different angle than to have the whole car repainted.

 

his resale value is shot.

i agree with clubmanS tho, try to stay with just the bumpers and get the other stuff cleaned up by a detailer.

swirls can be cleaned up. orange peel is inevitable.

 

i may do that. i gotta talk to my body guy. he does great work, he fixes a trunk lid that was dented on a 97 bimmer we had a while back, and when we traded it in, they had no clue it was ever painted, they couldnt tell. he does GREAT work, and hooks me up nice. hes a 100% perfectionist.

theres another local MINI guy here that said hes getting his re painted (by another shop) for 1000.

im not sure what i want to do yet, but i know i do want to get some flat black stripes on my hood, roof, and hatch, like MR GBMINI or w/e his user is.

glnr13, hit me up on aim if you are on the pc.

and i know my resale is shot, but when you mod a vehicle to this extent, thats what happens. i just need to get mine finished :( lol

 

Or just go with another color -- you can always say that was the reason for repainting.
I'd like to see a flat black MINI.

 

i dont like the way flat paint would look on my MINI, plus, i dont want to repaint under the hood and door jams, etc.

 

What kind of price is a full repaint?

Jack

 

i could probably get it done, with the handles, headlight rings, gas cap, arches, etc, repainted for a grand or so. i know a guy that owns a great body shop

 

Whats the usual cost on all of that, any one know? Sounds like a low price

 

My only experience was maybe 7 years ago when a Mazda dealer's body shop told me a repaint of my MX-6 would be about $7000.

That's dealer pricing, of course, but I would expect to pay a lot more than $1000. Having seen many car-makeover shows, I know there is a lot of labor required to prep a car. The poster is saying he knows a guy, so maybe he isn't paying much for labor.

As for resale, the easy way dealers can tell if you've resprayed is by feeling the edges of panels. The new paint doesn't wrap around to the other side of the panel, and you can feel the ridge on the edge of the panel where the new paint stopped.