rarora

So after a flawless driving record, I turned too sharp in a very narrow parking garage in Georgetown last night. Came around the corner and my back end hit a pillar....how dumb of me.....yes...i'm still kicking myself over it....i wasn't drinking or even going fast....just careless i suppose....the damage is everything behind the passenger sided door....i guess that would be the rear quarter panel....the problem is that it seems like that part of the CL is one piece...and just molds directly into the roof and rear window pillar....so i'm not sure if they'll be able to replace the panel. Any ideas what might happen here?

russianDude

get you car to the body-shop for an insurance estimate, and have them fix it. i was in accident too, much more major than yours $8500 worth of damage. my got got fixed and looks perfect.

rarora

yea, i'm just not sure how they will fix it. Also debating whether to report it to insurance or not, I guess I'll decide once I have an quote from the body shop. Did you go to the dealer or a general body shop?

einsatz

The exact same thing happened to my CL-S. Here's the column I hit... notice it's at an angle. I was making a right turn rather sharp because that is 2-way and the other car didn't make his stop:

Here's the damage:

It was actually a bit worse than it looks since it was dented pretty bad, too.

I took it to Pohanka collision in Chantilly. They did a pretty damn good job. I'm not sure how they did it but everything came out straight and the paint matched perfectly. Everything came out to about $1k. The one problem I had was that when I picked it up I could see little scratches in the clearcoat, so I told them I wouldn't take it like that and they had to send it back to the painters to buff it out twice before I everything was done right. They apparently weren't careful buffing it out because the metal trim around the rear 1/4 window had little scratches from the buffing machine, barely noticable but there.
I'm not sure I'd take my car back there though because of how they wanted me to take the car all scratched up looking like it had been keyed. They did detail the car inside and out though. It looked great!
I've heard great things about Stingray autobody in Purcellville though.

einsatz

btw most dealers won't do body work. And if they say they do, they're really just being the middleman with a bodyshop they've good the hookup with.

And after you get the quote... if you can spring it, pay for it out of pocket. Don't go through insurance unless you have to. They'll mark it as an at-fault accident just as if you had hit another car.

rarora

thanks so much for those pics and your post.....i'll give them a buzz in the morning..looks like i'm not the only one who made this mistake....thanks so much....the internet is amazing...

dfreder371

I just had the same thing happen to the left side of my CLS6, but I was hit by a car. Expect the damage to be around $3,500-$4,000.

What they will do is this: They will remove the sill plate on the passenger side. They will remove your rear window. They will remove the passenger side rear window. With a grinder or the like, they will cut the rear quarter panel at the appropriate point between the two removed windows. They will remove the combing (trim) that butts up to the door when it is closed. They will unbolt the quarter panel and also break the spotwelds that hold the quarter panel to the body. In other words, all the sheet metal under that sill plate will come out. They will remove the striker post and later on put it on the new panel after painting. The only place requiring any filler at all is where the cut was made, and when they put the new one on that area will be welded first.

This is really not that big of a deal if you find a good body shop. The shop should paint most, if not all of the new quarter panel while it is off of the car, both base coat and clear coat. Reassemble and then touch up the weld area.

You'd never tell that my car was hit. Good luck to you. Expect your car to be out of comission for two weeks from when they start on it.

CLean

Since there is no structure damage, they will most likely pull as much of the dent as possible and fill the rest in. I dont see any need to cut the panel off. It is nasty looking, but not that bad.

SPEEDYPAH

Just tell them your car got hit in a parking lot.

anothercls

1k is rather good price. I have an estimate of 400$ for a little dent and 1.5" scratch where some kid threw a rock at my car.

rarora

There are some pretty serious dents/creases in my panel...I probably won't have it worked on till next week, and get estimates this week, i'll try to squeeze an estimate a day in before work. Will keep you posted, thanks for the help.

evilone

they will more than likly just use a dent puller to flush out ur panel prob weld the hole over from the dent puller body putty paint and ur good.

Pure Adrenaline

iTrader: (2)

Get an estimate at a body shop of your choice.

If it's significantly more than your deductible, then you should think about filing a claim and have the insurance pick up the tab, minus your deductible. But if you can swing the cash, you should leave insurance out of this, since it never helps to have claims on your record.

Good luck.

GINge!

Not sure about our southern neighbours, but up here, if you tell the bodywork place that you are not claiming it on insurance, they will usually give you a better rate. If you offer to pay cash and not require a reciept, the price goes down even more (big underground economy here). It like if the bodyshop knows an insurance company will foot the bill, they charge full price.

kaliboy

Same thing just happened to me. Can anybody suggest a good body shop in Los Angeles to get an estimate from? Also im wondering how much my insurance will go up, i have a 500 deductible.

kaliboy

bump

CleanCL

iTrader: (4)

it depends on the damage, i have delt with many situations like yours. if the damage isn't serious to where the panel needs to be replaced, they can just fill it and such, it will probably cost around $1,000. to get the panel completely replaed will probably be upwards of $3,000.

LiQiCE

I'd recommend D&V Autobody in Chantilly. They do a really awesome job. I had the same kindof damage that you're describing except on my driver's side (pulled into a tight parking space without paying enough attention at 6am and cut it too close to the pillar on the driver's side).

Phone number is 703-478-9431 and their address is
25872 Polan Road, Chantilly, VA 20151

Anyways, if you choose to not go through insurance the guys there maybe able to cut you a break on the price. Thats what they did with me ... Only bad thing is there's no loaner car or anything and it took them about a week to do it. But they did everything right and got the car back to me looking perfect. You wouldn't have known that the car had ever gotten damaged.

Oh, for price I think they charged me about $750-800 to repaint the driver's side quarter panel and blend it into the door and the rear post. I had a small dent in the wheel well too which they banged out, and repainted. They did a bunch of other stuff too which they can explain to you but by now I've forgotten. It might be different for you depending on the amount of work needed and the car (I have a TL-S).

If you decide to go somewhere else, make sure you ask them what their painting process is. I asked a few different places and some places couldn't guarentee a 100% perfect job, some places didn't know exactly how many coats of clearcoat they put onto the car, and some places couldn't guarentee a perfect paint match. D&V Autobody had no problem with any of the questions I had. They told me they'd have it looking brand new again when I got it back, and they had no worries about paint matching since they said they use the same mixing machine that Honda/Acura uses.

Their shop is in a residential area and it doesn't look great. But they do great work, and thats what counts right? Oh, also empty out everything in your car. When I got my car back, all the loose change in my car was gone. I reported it to the owners, but thats still always a good practice to do when you leave the car with anyone.

BTW- Nothing against Pohanka, I like their dealership but their collision place has some serious problems. Someone took their RSX-S there to have some work done and another member who works near there saw the guy's car being beaten on in the parking lot. Thats really not cool.

Here's the link for reference: http://forums.clubrsx.com/showthread...hlight=pohanka

Here's another one:
http://forums.clubrsx.com/showthread...hlight=pohanka

rarora

Awesome post, I'm going to call them today. Thank you SO much, you never know who you are giving your car to, all the body shops will say they can do it, but the last thing you want is to get back a job that you aren't happy about. For the 800-1000 price range I'm thinking about not going through insurance, I'd rather not go though the hassle.

sundance_gold

Pohanka bodyshop did my back bumper when I was hit (4 yrs ago) and they did a great job. Still can't tell there was anything done....

rarora

I'm back from D&V, the car is back to nomal, phew! You can't even tell there was an accident unless you look at my bank account and notice $1000 missing. They did a superb job and took nearly 6 days to complete. Does anyone know what the best car detailing place is in and around Washington DC? The part that they worked on looks *better* than the rest of my car because it's ultra glossy and shiny. I need to have someone detail the rest of the car so that it has that candy coded gloss and smooth to the touch feel.


Thanks.

LiQiCE

Glad to hear D&V took care of you. They're great guys. Just a note, I don't know if they told you this ... but you're not supposed to put any sortof wax on the spots that got repainted or blended for at least a month, some shops recommend 3 months though. This is to allow for the paint to cure properly. You can keep it clean using Z5 or any other kind of detailing spray ... but wax will prevent the paint from breathing properly.

rarora

right on, thanks for the tip; they didn't mention that. Do you know of any places that do a good job detailing around here?

pimpinTL02

falls church auto body shop on jefferson hwy did a good job on my scratch i got 3 years ago... You could never tell it was there. Excellent job.. they fix my 2 inch scratch on my rear door (TL) and bumper for 900 took about a week