Okay, it happened. The dreaded door ding. Bottom third of the Club Door. Now, I want to do something about it. I saw a recommendation for Dent Masters on NAM and I brought the car to them today. (The ding is your basic quarter sized ding with no cracks in the paint.) They say that they can find no easy way to get to the ding short of either removing all of the interior door trim or taking the door off of the car and accessing the ding via the hole for the electrical wires. Their other suggestion was to drill a hole in the door, fix the ding, then cap the hole.

As you can imagine, I am not crazy about the hole drilling option. I would think removing the door trim would be the best option, but, I am open for suggestions. If anyone has had any success with a PDR person in Northern Virginia (Arlington area), I would be grateful for any recommendations. MoS uses Dent Wizards who come to the dealership which is about 20 miles from home for me. Maybe that is the way to go as they might have more experience with taking MINIs apart...thoughts?? Thanks.

 

I only have experience with Dent Wizard--the person at the dealer (not in VA though). I've used them 3 times now. Each job has been excellent. I cannot tell at all where the dent was.

Cost was about $80+/- and depended on the location of the ding (difficulty in access).

 

I've used Dent Wizard in the Orlando area several times on my Miata and each time the result was fantastic; far better than expected! I'm an extremely fussy person, very particular about my cars and I could find no fault with the repair. I was skeptical about them making a hole in the body as well, but it turned out great! In your case, that may be easier and less costly than disassembling your door. From your description, the access hole will most likely be in the door jamb, and the cap/plug will look similar to the ones above and below the chrome latching mechanism on the club door. IMHO, it really doesn't look as bad as you might think.

Twice on my car, the tech. was unable to reach the ding without punching/drilling a hole in the body and then filling it with a black rubber plug. One time, the capped access hole ended up in the door jamb which looks completely normal, and unless you were comparing one door against another, no one would ever question it. The other time it ended up inside the wheel well which is totally unnoticeable unless you're looking under the car. These guys are pretty good at choosing an inconspicuous place to make a hole and if you get a really skilled tech., it's well worth the price (roughly $100) and definitely beats a repaint.

Good Luck with it, and remember to be thankful the paint's not broken!

 

Only lazy/poorly trained PDR rookies would ever have the ***** to suggest putting hole in your brand new car.

Get a second opinion from a different PDR tech/company. I have seen hack jobs done by people that should not be allowed to get near customer's cars.

 

My Dent Wizard tech (He has over 10 years experience) would never ever drill a hole in your car. He even has an air pressure dent puller tool that works wonders. When it comes to quality PDR repairs, it all comes down to the skill level and patience of the PDR tech to do the job right.

Like I said, only lazy hacks that want to make a quick buck will put holes in your car. Absolutely disgusting to even suggest it.

 

Drilling holes weakens structural integrity, and leads to rust and corrosion?
A professional Paintless Dent Repair facility and technician would repair dents without resorting to drilling, because drilling can lead to major problems.

The standard method of repairing dents via PDR is to massage the metal from underneath or back-side of the dent, using special hand tools. To gain access to the back-side, the technician may have to remove certain panels and liners from inside the vehicle, which take time and costs more. There is no guarantee that even if the customer (or insurer) pays for removing the panels, that the technician will remove the panels.

The short-cut and a more profitable way to repair the complex dents is to drill holes to gain access to the dents, without having to remove panels and liners. Once a hole is drilled in the metal, many problems will occur after some time if the hole is not sealed and protected correctly. Problems may include corrosion, unsightly black plugs to cover the holes, nicked wires and harness, and more. If too many holes are drilled on a panel, the structural integrity of the panel would be compromised, and can lead to panel failure in the event of an accident.

At Pro Dent, we consider drilling a hole as the absolute last resort (meaning there is no other way to repair the dent by paintless Dent Repair technique), and only after we obtain customer’s approval prior to drilling a hole.


Source: http://www.prodentinc.com/didyouknow.asp#2

 

Please be advised that taking the interior panel off the club door is about the easiest thing you can do to your car. I had mine off in like two minutes while replacing all my speakers. It's a snap, literally. Sorry about the ding.

 

Paint free dent repair is at a high level these days. I had 11 dents, visible only to me and my repair man, but he got them all out. One was in my club door!
I'm up in Traverse City and this guy is talented; I'll bet you can find one there.

 

pbeths -
Check out Spectrum Collision on Four Mile Run. They currently have our Clubbie for major work.

 

I had a local here that has been doing it for years, and one ding that was on the passenger side above the rear tire, I had him drill a hole (about the size of a dime) and plugged it up. Unless I knew to look for it I would never have known. It will NOT compromise the structural integrity of your car...

 

I just took my Clubbie to Spectrum. This is the 6th car I've taken to them since they opened. They are absolutely top notch. When the insurance compnay gives you some BS quote they will go to the mat to get it done the right way.

BTW, I saw your clubbie in the shop, sorry! They were saying you'll have it in the shop longer then you've owned it...yikes!

 

I, too, have used PDR. It's the best! My guy took out a dent as big as a softball!
The hole he mentioned is in the jamb, as mentioned earlier, and looks like a plugged access hole... no problem.

 

Not quite, but long enough for my son to start calling the Kia Spectra rental "our car"

 

We got one in exactly the same place about 6 months ago. Unfortunately, the paint was chipped and they had to repaint the whole side of the car to match it. It came out perfect. Cost was around $600...but the idiot who did it admitted and paid for it!!!

 

Hi here in the uk we have some guys called dent devils.I used them in november the guy made a hole in the rear wheel arch and fixed my dent from the back. fantastic job well worth the £70 quid

 

Thanks for all the responses, guys! I will definately contact Spectrum in Alexandria. I agree that the guy who gave me the first quote is probably an amateur and I will look for someone who seems to have more experience. I'll post after the repair and let you know how it all went. Thanks again!

 

OWG,

I got my Clubman on 16 July! I love your color combination; will look for your Clubbie at Spectrum and thanks again for the recommendation.

 

I got a door ding over the summer at some point, isn't even a year old. The smooth lines of the MINI makes it stand out.

I'm just mad, since I always park farther out, or at the end of a row or next to a median, so I always have at least one side protected.

Some people are sociopaths, I swear.

I park at the end of a row, with easily 8-10 spaces between me and the next car, and come out sometimes only a half hour later, to find a cluster of cars around me, with empty spaces in between me and the original cluster. Seriously? WTF?

I also have people that notice I park close to the edge of the space if i'm at the end of a row, and use that as an invitation to crowd up on the line on the other side of the parking space. "You left room in your space? Thanks, i'll take it!"

One guy in a giant oversize POS truck parked sideways into my space, backwards, in a compact spot. It was a squeeze for my fiance to get in. She's still mad at me because I hocked a giant loogee on the guy's windshield for his 'courtesy'.

Sorry for my rant, sometimes I feel like going parking vigilante.

 

It is a losing battle.

I have managed to keep my 2005 MCS ding and dent free for nearly 4 years...

 

+1!!!! Drilling a hole?!?!?! I've never even heard of a PDR tech suggesting such a thing!

Go to your dealer. Ask them who does their body work (if they outsource it, which I'm sure they do). Talk to their body shop and ask them who the best PDR guy in town is.

If they have to drill a hole... it's not real PDR. That's for a body shop. I had a place on my car that needed PDR that was nye impossible to get to and the guy I talked to never would have suggested such a thing. He was almost ready to take the sunroof out to get to it!

Drilling + PDR = absurd.

 

That's impressive.

 

He suggested you do what? I think someone already drilled a hole in his head.

 

I know most people ask how big of a dent you can fix with PDR, but I have the exact opposite question - how small of a blemish can PDR improve?

I have two spots on my car that can't even legitimately be called "dents". The affected areas are each about an inch or so in diameter, and you can only tell something's wrong because the reflections in the paint are a little bit "wavy" if you catch the light just right. In fact, they look like what I would imagine the "after" pictures looking like if PDR was used to repair a "real" dent.

I'm a little hesitant to take my car to a PDR service because frankly, anything less than a perfect result isn't going to be enough of a difference from how it looks now to warrant spending any money on it.

 

A good PDR tech can get a dent (that he can properly get to) 100% out. They'll usually be up front with you as to whether or not they can get it 100% or not. As long as the dents are accessible and not in a weird shape that will crack the paint, PDR can get it done.

 

I got a nasty little dent in my MCS (assembled 11/08) while on a road trip around the country in February and March. A stone kicked up from an 18 wheeler, hit the hood then the windshield. I saw the dent later, about an inch across with chipped paint. Crap!

Since it's on the hood (OK, Bonnet) you don't see it every day like you do a door panel. So I bought a Chili Red paint stick from my dealer when I got home, painted the little chipped area, and honestly I haven't noticed the ding since I checked it the day after I applied the paint.

Maybe I'm just an insensitive type but I really got over it rather quickly.