c/auto-body-repairers

Old timer's fender welding trick actually saved me 2 hours today

A retired guy named Pete over at the Denver shop told me to skip the copper backing bar and just use a wet rag clamped behind the panel when welding thin fenders. I always thought that was hack stuff, but I tried it on a 2015 Focus quarter panel this morning and it worked way better than I expected. No burn through, minimal warping, and it took me about 40 minutes total versus the usual 2 hours plus grinding. Has anyone else used this method, or is there a reason I should stick with the copper bars for production work?

2 comments

faith27•12h ago

Realized my paint booth lights were the problem, not my spraying

Last week I was fighting a runny clear coat on a 2018 F-150 hood at my shop in Tulsa. I blamed my gun settings for 2 days, kept adjusting pressure and fluid, still garbage finish. Then I noticed the booth's fluorescent tubes were flickering and casting shadows right where the runs kept showing up. Swapped in 6 LED strips, total cost $180, and the SAME settings laid down perfectly smooth. Has anyone else chased a spray issue that turned out to be a lighting problem in the booth?

2 comments

danielk84•1d ago

Does paint matching trump panel gaps when a customer is staring at the door line?

Had a guy in my shop Tuesday, 2017 silver Tacoma, and he kept walking past the blend I was proud of to poke at a 2mm gap on the replacement fender. He said 'that line is off' and honestly, I argued back for a minute about how paint is what people notice first. Is the trade getting too picky about gaps, or are we slacking on fit because we lean on clearcoat to hide stuff?

2 comments

joseph48•4d ago

OEM scan tool vs cheap knockoff, learned that lesson the hard way in Newark

Picked up a $180 generic scanner to program a bumper sensor on a 2022 F-150. Three hours wasted, car threw a CEL and the ABS light came on, had to borrow my buddy's OEM tool for $90 an hour rental. Anyone else burn money on those cheap clones or am I the only sucker here?

2 comments

angelamurphy•4d ago

PPG paint code matched but shade was off by a mile on a pearl white

Had a 2022 Toyota in Tacoma last week, code said 070 but the blend still showed pinkish under the booth lights. Anyone else run into pearl whites where the formula needs a second look before spraying?

2 comments

danielk84•4d ago

Swapped my old flood lights for LED strips inside the booth, huge difference in match quality

I used to paint with those big fluorescent fixtures buzzing overhead and always had to walk out to the sun to check my metallic blends, which ate up so much time. Last month I put in six LED strip lights along the walls of my booth in Tacoma and now I can see the flop clearly without moving the car. Has anyone else made this switch and found they had to re-learn their mixing ratios because the light shows everything?

2 comments

sandragrant•5d ago

Shoutout to the local salvage yard near St. Louis that saved my butt on a 2010 Honda door panel

Last Tuesday I was stuck matching a faded silver paint on a 2010 Civic, and the blend just wasn't working. I called around three parts suppliers and nobody had the trim piece I needed. Then I drove out to this yard off Highway 40, and they had a whole matching door in the same shade with no dents. I pulled it for $80 and had it swapped in under two hours. Made my client happy and saved me a day of mixing. Anybody else got a go-to yard they swear by?

2 comments

fionanguyen•6d ago

Had a fender repair come back after three months and it taught me something about filler

I did a rear quarter panel job last spring on a 2010 Civic. Used what I always use, sanded it down, primed it, painted it. Three months later the customer comes back and there's a hairline crack right along where I'd laid the filler. I blended a fresh batch that day but I think the shop temp was too cold when I mixed it. Has anyone else run into trouble with filler curing right when the weather is below 60 degrees?

2 comments

hannahj49•7d ago

My uncle who ran a body shop for 30 years told me to always use flexible primer on plastic bumpers, and I called him old school until I had a 2022 Camry come back with the paint cracking 3 months later.

He said it would adhere better with the bumper flexing and I went with a standard high-build primer instead, so now I'm sanding it down and redoing the whole job, anyone else ever ignore old timer advice and pay for it?

2 comments

sanchez.julia•7d ago

Hot take: I used to block sand everything by hand like a stubborn old fool

For the first 8 years in this trade I swore by hand sanding. I thought power sanders were for lazy guys who didn't care about straight panels. Then last winter I had a 2018 F-150 with a salvage rear quarter and spent 14 hours hand sanding the filler and primer. My shoulder locked up for three days and I couldn't hold a coffee cup. My buddy Rob from the shop down in San Antonio finally talked me into trying his DA with 220-grit and I finished the same job in 4 hours with fewer high spots. Now I only hand sand edges and tricky contours. I still feel a little guilty when I pull the trigger on that sander. Anyone else waste years doing things the hard way because of pride?

3 comments

mason_murray8•9d ago

My air hammer died mid-stroke on a quarter panel last Tuesday

Had a customer car sitting in the bay waiting for me to finish the weld-in, and the tool just locked up solid with the bit stuck in the metal, so I had to borrow a rusty backup from the shop next door to get the job done by closing time - has anyone else had a pneumatic tool crap out at the worst possible moment?

2 comments

ross.kim•9d ago

I finally painted a bumper at a Pep Boys parking lot at 9pm

Had a customer show up 2 hours late and needed their bumper done before a wedding the next morning. My shop was closed so I set up a makeshift spray booth next to a dumpster using trash bags and a work light. Has anyone else had to do a repair in a weird spot like that?

2 comments

zarat37•12d ago

My brand new paint gun clogged after 10 minutes on a job yesterday

Honestly, I was livid. I grabbed a fresh HVLP gun I just bought, a Devilbiss model, to spray a hood on a 2018 F-150 in Marietta. Ten minutes in, the tip sputtered and then just stopped. I had to stop everything, tear it down right there in the shop, and found a tiny piece of dried paint stuck in the fluid nozzle from the factory. No idea how it got there, maybe from their quality check. I spent 45 minutes flushing it with acetone and using a pick to get it clear. Has anyone else had a brand new gun fail like that right out of the box?

2 comments

white.keith•19d ago

Ran into a 1990s Volvo bumper that took me 6 hours to line up

I was working on an old 940 wagon last week and that front bumper just would NOT sit flush no matter what I tried. Ended up spending a full afternoon shimming and adjusting the brackets on a car that should have been a 2 hour job. Has anyone else dealt with those weird Volvo bumpers from that era?

3 comments

finleym37•1mo ago

Had a nightmare day with a 2018 Ford F-150 last Tuesday in Akron

I was working on this Ford that came in with what looked like a simple fender bender - you know, bumper cover and a headlight. But when I pulled the bumper, I found the radiator support was twisted and the AC condenser had a tiny leak from the impact. Three hours into disassembly and the customer calls saying he can only pay for the bumper (like $450) and wants me to patch the rest. Has anyone else dealt with customers trying to nickel-and-dime on hidden damage they don't see?

3 comments

parker_hall5•1mo ago

An estimator at a Chevy dealer made me rethink how I write up dent repair

I had this guy from the local Chevy dealership come look at a job I was pricing out for a '17 Silverado with a dented bed side. He told me I was over quoting labor because I wasn't accounting for the inner structure bracing behind that panel. He showed me how the reinforcement ribs make pulling from the outside way harder than I thought. After that I started breaking down bed side repairs into two separate line items, one for outer skin and one for any access work needed inside. Has anyone else had an adjuster or estimator point out something that totally changed your write up process?

3 comments

gray314•1mo ago

Just found out my cheap paint gun was costing me 2 hours per job

I was digging through some old receipts last week and added up how long I've been using this $40 HVLP gun from Harbor Freight. Turns out I've had it for about 3 years now and did over 200 jobs with it. But then I borrowed my buddy's $300 gun for a fender repair and I finished the basecoat in half the time. No joke, I was blowing through way more material and doing extra passes because the spray pattern was so uneven. Has anyone else made the switch from cheap guns and actually tracked how much time you saved?

3 comments

sanchez.julia•1mo ago

TIL that old guy at the paint supply shop was right

A few months back this older painter named Hank at the Auto Paint Supply in Tulsa told me to stop using wax and grease remover on bare metal before primer. Said it just pushes contaminants around. I ignored him, kept doing it my way, and ended up with fisheyes on a '72 Chevelle fender I was doing. Had to strip it down and start over, cost me an extra 6 hours. Has anyone else had a veteran painter give advice that seemed backwards but turned out spot on?

3 comments

andrew_baker9•1mo ago

Saw a guy in my shop put Bondo directly over bare metal without any etch primer

Is it just me or does that always crack out within 6 months and then you're doing a full strip and redo?

3 comments

sethm58•1mo ago

Had a fender repair from a chain shop last week, but my buddy at a small outfit says they cut corners

The chain shop fixed it in 2 days for $800, but my buddy says they used filler instead of pulling the metal right. Who's had better luck with independent guys versus the big chains?

3 comments

anna717•1mo ago

Found out my new DA sander has a weird quirk the hard way

I picked up that new pneumatic DA from Harbor Freight last week and went to town on a 2012 Civic fender. The thing started chattering bad after 10 minutes, turns out their backing pad is way softer than it looks, so I had to swap it for a 3M pad. Has anyone else run into the backing plate being the weak link on these?

3 comments

oliviabutler•1mo ago

Hot take: 3M's green tape is overrated for masking trim

After 10 years in the shop down in Tampa, I finally ditched 3M's green fine line tape for the orange stuff from Grainger. Last week on a 2022 F-150, the green tape peeled clear coat off the B-pillar trim and I had to re-shoot the whole door. Why does everyone still swear by this stuff when it fails in Florida humidity? Anybody found a tape that actually holds up in heat?

3 comments

adam414•1mo ago

That $35 paint thickness gauge from Harbor Freight actually works

Bought one last week to check a used car before quoting and it caught 3 panels with heavy filler that looked perfect to the naked eye, anyone else trust cheap tools like this or am I just lucky?

3 comments

kimr91•1mo ago

Shoutout to the guy who told me to try a stud welder on my dent job last weekend

I was working on a 2010 Honda Civic door from a hail storm in Phoenix and figured I'd just do the old body filler route like I always have. Well, I borrowed a stud welder from a buddy and pulled out the bigger dents first, and the amount of filler I used dropped by about 75%. Has anyone else ditched straight filler for more pulling on their jobs?

3 comments

the_elizabeth•1mo ago

Talk with a painter who uses nothing but single stage changed my mind on clear coats

I was at the supply shop last Tuesday picking up some 2k primer and got to talking with this older painter who's been in the game since the 80s. He said he hasn't touched clear coat in 15 years and just shoots single stage on everything including his personal Chevy truck from 72. I laughed at first but then he showed me photos of a 5 year old job that still looked wet. He pointed out that modern clear is great for fixing mistakes but if you lay single stage down right it's tough as nails and way easier to buff out later. Now I'm thinking about trying a single stage job on a beater just to see how it holds up compared to my usual base clear routine. Has anyone here actually gone back to single stage for daily drivers or is this just old timer nostalgia talking?

3 comments