i purchased a Certified pre owned TL-S about 4 months ago.. clean condition.. but recently the paint on the bumper has been starting to show a lot of bubbles and it looks like its going to peel off soon. is the paint job covered under any warranty? the TL-S currently has 51000 miles on it. the bubbles started to appear around 48k miles. I have attached a couple of pics to show you what it looks like. (to be honest it looks much worse than it looks in the pics)

I did get a bumper to bumper dealer warranty on top of the CPO warranty.
suggestions please.


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Many cars have chipped, cracked paint on the bumpers, so the dealer has a shop do a quick and inexpensive spray to make it look good. The bubbles will grow unless the bumper is properly redone.

No paint coverage with the warranty, and the B to B Acura Car Care warranty is far from bumper to bumper as many other items aren't covered.

Suggest that you take it back to the dealer and see if they can help you in the repair, not a spot repaint, but done the right way, take the paint on the entire bumper down and respray with the correct additives.

 

poor prep job, incorrect materials used

 

I see a lot of cars bought used that have both bumpers repainted .. usually lease returns ... but anyway .. the dealers send them out for a cheap pretty up repaint to get them sold ..

Most flake , peel , bubble in a few months and just get worse. Only solution is a good repaint.

1/2 the time the shop doesn't even use flex agents.

 

Full strip, prep, prime, and repaint required...I would be PISSED!!! Just because the paint may not be covered by warranty, is no excuse for your "new" car to look like shit after 4 months...Fight for it!!

 

i bought a 2000 nissan maxima a year ago and it still shines like the paint is new. i cannot believe acura has shitty paint on a 40k $ car. wtf.. it starts to peel off especially if it rains.

btw thanks for ur input. how much would all those work would cost? (estimate).
i put 10k miles on the car and it looks like i need new brakes too.. but im getting that fixed. i just dont want to pay for painting the car tho.

 

There is nothing wrong with OEM Acura paint ... its the quality of the bumper repaint .. read my above post.

Face it ... would you have bought the car if the bumpers were all scratched up and marked from the previous owner/leasor and thier crap parking habits?

THATS why the dealers send them for bumper repaints and they don't care about quality .. just as long as it lasts long enough to sell it.

 

yup ^, buy new if you can and hope the car already doesnt have new paint on it from delivery damage.

 

Depends where you go...a decent job could be had for around $400 or so, but that is besides the point. I WOULD NOT PAY for this....maybe you and I have different personalities, but I'd go into the dealer (politely at first) and basically tell them what I had written to you in my first post..."Just because the paint may not be covered under warranty, is no excuse for my "new" car to look like shit after 4 months". If you handle yourself in a professional manner, hopefully they will as well and make it right.

If you are unable to reason with them, you could always protest like this jeep guy did...

http://www.myjeeprocks.com/forums/sh...ucson-Arizona.

 

thanks for the suggestions. i am taking my car to the dealership tomorrow. i tried calling them and when i did let them know about the problem they hung up on me. (called 3 times and the same thing happens everytime). hopefully i can get this fixed after i talk to them tomorrow.

 

Dude not to be an ass but wtf are you talking about? You obviously bought a car that has had some repaint work. How does some body shop or some dude that re-sprays cars bumpers in the parking lot have anything to do with Acura's original paint? No OEM original paint will do what is shown in that picture. You should have inspected the car a little better otherwise you would have seen that your car has had some work done. Hopefully I didnt come off as too much of an ass, but dont bash Acura just because the car you bought isnt original.

Just because the car was certified does not mean that some panels werent repainted. You bought the car used car so there is no paint warranty, and certainly no warranty on paint that isnt even original. The only thing the dealership might do is give you an ok deal on getting the bumper painted at their body shop if they have one.

To fix that you will have to have the bumper re-painted.

 

as others have said its not the paint, its how it was applied. if the dealer is sleazy enough to do a quick job on the bumper and then when the bumper starts going to shit and you call them on it they hang up on you. tells you a lot about the dealer you bought from.

i have issues with my bumper from previous body shop work where it is apparent that something went wrong during the process of the painting of the replacement bumper. i'm is slightly different situation than you are since my work is covered by the body shop's warranty.

a high end shop in my area for a bumper repaint is running about $600.

you need to take this up with the dealer and then see what they say. its hard to say that it was the dealer that had the repaint done. are you sure it wasn't the previous owner (i'm just saying)? i spent a week trying to bark up trees and get my bumper taken care of. nothing is set in stone just yet until i actually take the car back and get the body shop to do it right (different location than the original shop that i went to, same company), but at least they have agreed to take care of it.

be polite and persistent (persistent is the operative word) with the dealer. you have to play on how disappointed you are in the fact that you paid for a CPO vehicle that was supposed in like new condition, but turns out that its in rougher shape than initially thought with the bumper like it is. get them to see it from your point of view based on your expectations of a CPO vehicle and see if they are more understanding.

 

TLtrigirl. sorry to hear that your in kinda the same situation i am in. the car was bought from ELITE ACURA, NJ. its the only closes acura dealership near i live. it sucks that a company like that sells cars of this cheap quality. Im taking it to the dealership tomorrow. hopefully i can get it fixed through them.

i have no idea if the car was painted by the previous owner. im guessing the dealership painted it because it was in mint condition when i bought it.

 

careful with how you word things here. remember its not acura that sold you the car, its the dealer. so you can rant all you want about the dealer.

i don't know anything about NJ dealerships, but it seems like they took the quick and easy route to fix the car if in fact that is what they did (which many have already said probably happened). its a slimy practice. my dealer probably wouldn't bother and send that type of car off to auction. they keep the cream of the crop and send the rest off to auction.

keep in mind, its the bumper. yes its flawed with a poor paint job, it shouldn't happen, and its a inconveniece to get it fixed. it could always be worse and the tranny crapped out. if its a highly reputable dealer, they'll make it right. however by what you've already said with them hanging up on you...i'd have them fix the bumper and then find another dealer to go to for other issues (that type of crap is not the way customer service should be done). keep us updated.

 

thanks for every1s input. i took it to the dealer today and they said the car has the original acura paint job. hence they are going to cover it under warranty. getting it repainted next week.

 

glad to hear they are going to take care of it...i've never heard of the factory paint failing like that on any car. maybe the previous owner had it painted before.

my car is at the shop right now having "surgery." make sure to inspect the work really well when you get it back (ie paint matches, dust, etc).

 

thanks .. i hope they do a good job.

what happened to ur car?

 

Im still not convinced thats original paint but if they say it is ;-) Its almost as if it was melted or heated up too much and caused bubbling. Still never have seen anything like that. Let us know how it turns out when its done.

James

 

Good news. Make sure you get a warranty for the repair because bumpers are really tricky when it comes to repainting.

I tend to agree. I have never seen factory paint do that, but have seen a re-painted bumper peel almost every time.

 

here you go:

https://acurazine.com/forums/3g-tl-problems-fixes-114/blistered-bumper-paint-832702/

i'm with everyone on the "original paint" theory. though...the dealer is fixing it...hopefully they will do a good job.

the body shop my car is at right now is making sure that everything is done correctly this time and minimizing any possibility of future issues. so far they are making things right. only time will tell once i get the car back.

 

No way that's original paint. I have an 04 with 155k on it with original paint on the front bumper and while it has a lot of little chips and pits in it, there is no bubbling or anything like what you show... and I live in the snow/salt belt where the cars' exterior gets abused by the elements.