Hello all,

This weekend I hand washed my car for the first time since getting it almost 2 months ago. In doing so, I noticed a short but deep scratch on one of the rear doors. It looks like the scratch was once filled with touch up paint but now it's starting to turn to a slight rusty color and it was a very little bubble next to it. See the picture... It's hard to take a good shot but I circled the imperfection in red.

I showed it to a very reputable shop that repairs wrecked cars and asked them if they could just fix it on the cheap. They basically said that would need to repaint the whole door and that would run me $600. It's mucho dineros ! And would they be able to match the pearl finish properly ? According to the same guy, he thinks that if left untouched, by the end of next winter, I may be looking at a rust spot the size of a nickel !

Is there really no way to get someone to sand off the rust bubble and touch it up somewhat decently ?

Also, since I got this as a CPO, should the dealer take care of it ? I mean... sure.. it's a used car but this is more than a small scratch. The fricking paint is starting to bubble up on a 2012 with 25k miles ! Perhaps I should argue that with the dealership ?

Looking for feedback please !

Thanks

 

If it's not too deep, use a clay bar and remove the rust particle then use touchup paint and dap a small amount. It might not be perfect but it'll save you from that $600 price tag... at least until other scratches or dents come along. I wouldn't do a whole door just because of that little thing.

 

^^ I agree I would just use touch up paint.. It’s hard to tell from the photo but if you feel the extent of the rust is bad use a brush on rust inhibitor before applying the touch up paint..

As far as complaining to the dealer.. Unless you can prove that the scratch was there prior to taking delivery 2 months ago there probably isn’t much they will do. Think about it, you’ve had the car two months and the dealer will said anything could have happened in that time-frame. Maybe they will offer to give you the touch up paint but that’s probably about it.

From the photo you took I believe the damage under the CPO guidelines would have only required the dealer to touch up the scratch anyway, I doubt the dealer would have painted the entire door for that scratch.

And if the scratch is as small as it looks in the photo, IMO I would rather touch it up then have them paint the entire door and risk them not matching the paint properly. That would drive me more nuts then the scratch.

 

Rust is like cancer for cars.
You want to get rid of it before it spreads.
I would take a 3000grit sandpaper, cut a tiny bit of it and glue it to a eraser end of a pencil. Roll? or spin? the pencil to get the rust off. Or any other form so that you localize and minimize the amount of surrounding paint you take off. Taping off also helps. Then apply some rust inhibitor and then apply touch up to minimize the potential for further rusting. You can further sand down the excessive paint and buff the area but since the area is going to be very small, I doubt it will be too much of an eye sore.

If the rust was coming from underneath the paint, you may have a case for warranty work but since the cause was from a scratch, I doubt the dealer will do anything on this.

 

Like C8N mentioned, use sandpaper and a pencil. Check out this video:

 

If you don't already have paint, you could buy touch-up paint directly from the Dealer for less than $20. The colour will match quite well even though for a tiny spot like that it doesn't even matter.

 

This guy from AMMO is amazing.