abanner

Acura agreed to repaint my white diamond pearl bumper covers........factory paint is not even close to matching the body!

Shoot2Thrill

Can you supply more info on the history of this. What did Acura say was the root cause. It would be interesting although might be difficult due to lighting conditions to get before and after photographs.

rynpamn21

yeah what happened???

FLAcuraTLS

damn, that sucks that this paint problem is still occuring in the 04 TL..my 2002 TLS had this same problem and i had my bumpers repainted to better match the rest of the car..only good part is acura took care of the painting costs.

abanner

Service mgr told me this has been a problem for years. They paint the plastic bumper covers in one run and each car individually...think they could get the paint to match. The body shop said he could do a 100% match, even though the bumpers use flex paint. If you have a diamond pearl TL, just tell service mgr you want the paint to match (not too much to ask) and Acura will pay to repaint correctly

BrandHdriver

"Flex" paint is just an additive in standard paint.

Properly done, the body shop will sand off the clear coat on the back part of the car, then feather or blend in the new bumper paint over the original paint on the car. Then, they'll re-apply clear coat over the bumper and back part of the car. Voila, your car will look perfect! Done any other way, I doubt they'll really be able to satisfy you.

If you ever have body damage repaired, be sure to insist on paint blending. It's a virtual guarantee to make the paint look perfect, as long as they used the original paint color key found in the door jamb.

Shoot2Thrill

I can more likely see the dealership showing you to the lot where they are all like that and say that's they way they come! There must be some documentation on this if Acura is going to pay.

abanner

The documentation is "customer not happy". The dealer got the Acura Rep to agree to paint the bumper TO MATCH the body.......not too much to ask

Shoot2Thrill

Your right, it is not too much to ask. Glad it went so easy.

fendogz

I'm having the same problem with my rear bumper, I will be going to my dealer to ask them to repaint it. Hope I get the same response that you did.
I'll keep you posted!!

5AT/WDP/QUARTZ no NAVI

VTEC=happiness

Me too. I have just been putting up with it, telling myself that it is no big deal, but I am just sick and tired of my friends giving me a hard time for having bumpers that do not match. I called my dealers customer relations manager and left a message yesterday and I look forward to getting the same response that abanner got.

BTW, did they take it back to paint it, or send you to their authorized body shop? Also, were you supplied with a rental car for the time you were without your TL?? THX

One more BTW...how is it that they can get our rocker panels (aka side skirts) the same color, but not the bumpers?? They are plastic too, right?

Moodie

Haven't looked too closely, BUT if it's off ever so slightly, I'd rather not have them repaint the bumper......that's just me, I guess...

What if the repaint is not good or up to par and the time and hassle to not have the car and worries will be more than I ask for....just IMHO.

cM3go

I'm feelin it too

http://www.acura-tl.com/forums/showthread.php?t=75958

VTEC=happiness

My back bumper is bad enough that one guy asked if it was off of a different car...he thought I already had the rear bumper replaced since it was so yellow looking and really did not match the rest of the car

VTEC=happiness

You considering going to Acura with your problem?

cM3go

i am...

jdl75

The up side to all this is the paint used by a body shop is still the old-style, petrochemical-based solvent, as opposed to the water based paint used at the factory. The petrochem solvent paint is MUCH harder than the water-based paint. Won't chip nearly as badly.

mr_superlove

Hey do any of you guys have any update on this issue? abanner, have you taken it in yet? The results? cTLgo or VTEC? What response did you get from the dealership?

I'm experiencing the same thing and my obsessive-compulsiveness is starting to take over. I'm running out to the garage every hour, I guess expecting it magically change and start matching.

My wife has a pearl RSX and the bumpers match hers much more closely.

VTEC=happiness

Had a meeting with the service manager on this issue on Friday. I initially began by acknowledging the fact that the bumpers and the sheetmetal of the car may not ever match exactly, but that my car is so far off that the bumper looks kind of yellow. He looked at the color difference, and (like a fuc*ing robot) kept telling me how the color difference is normal and that this is something that will always be the case with pearl white cars and metalic silver cars. I then asked him why my friend's Lexus IS300, which is per white, has bumpers that match well. No response on that one.

His next attempt to convince me that my problem was "normal" was to take me back on the lot and show me other cars with the same problem. I told him that I didn't care that he could show me the same problem on another car, and that seeing it on other cars wouldn't make me feel any better about mine. Well, he insisted, so I followed. Oddly enough, however, he took me to a white and then a silver TSX, both of which had almost perfect bumpers. Needless to say, he looked like an ass pretty quickly.

On a side note, he also tried to excuse away the fact that some in his department hit my car with something when it was in for its last service. My bumper has a gash with a wierd trail of red paint (due to position on the bumper, you can tell it wasn't from a car hitting it). When I asked him about that, he claimed that there was nothing that was red in his service area, so he couldn't have caused the problem. Well,I went over to the bays to look for myself. Guess what I found?? Lots of red metal tool carts and barrels. Suddenly he is going to help me out and fix my front bumper.

OK, enough rambling...END RESULT:

Talked to the customer relations manager at the dealership (she is great). Now I have an appointment with the regional Acura guy sometime in the next 30 days. I will let you know what happens.

mr_superlove

Yes! I went out to the dealership last night and noticed the same thing. The TSX paint jobs looked fine, but other colors of the TLs had a variation in the pearlization. I noticed it on the SSM and the Green Pearl as well.

Like you said, didn't make me feel any better.

I appreciate the update and will be interested to hear how things progress.

VTEC=happiness

Did you speak to someone at the dealer about it??? I can't believe they look me in the eye and say this is normal. Its not like they did the paint job...why can't they just admit that the factory did a poor job?

mr_superlove

More on this...

I talked to the service manager and he, too, stated that they're aware that several colors have a variation. He said that the flex additive they put into paint intended to cover plastic flexible parts will cause the discoloration, darkening.

I found one site to support that assertation, in section 20.1.
http://www.xs11.com/faq/paintfaq.shtml#Color Mismatch0

I guess they could go a few shades lighter and "back it down" to the appropriate shade?

I also found an old thread on this board discussing the same problem. No one in this thread got Acura to agree to repaint:
http://66.102.11.104/search?q=cache:...hl=en&ie=UTF-8

Again, that doesn't explain why the TSX's on the lot and my wife's RSX or the body kit match much more closely.

Anyway, I have a meeting with the Acura Rep on Thursday.

abanner

Just got my pearl TL back from the dealer. They got approval to repaint the bumpers. Perfect job !!!! Matches exactly, even with the flex paint. There is no excuse for a mismatch from the factory

mr_superlove

Excellent news! Thanks for keeping us updated.