So my brother-in-law's car just got keyed. Short of a body shop to repaint it is there anything else to do?

Opinions are appreciated!

 

im sure it can be fixed. you might still see something but im sure gona be less then if door is not blended right. is it white or white pearl?

 

I'd like to know as well. I just used a toothpick and dabbed a bit here and there on the keyed area. Your bro in law's scratch doesn't look too deep though so there's still hope. Looks like some of it can be buffed out, the whitish gray area.

 

it looks deep in second picture. its either down to metal or its mark from key or something

 

One thing I forgot to mention is that it is almost 3/4 the length of the door. It also looks to be down to the metal in the "gray" area's and it's a scratch that can be felt with the finger nail the entire length. The pictures don't really show how bad it is, I doubt buffing will take it out with my PC. As I don't have a rotary buffer.

He's going to take it to a body shop tomorrow to see what they say. I'm just too busy to really give it a shot at trying to buff it out, plus I have my doubts to being able to "fix" it.

Plus earlier in the day as he was heading over to his folks house he hit something on the freeway that slammed right into his front bumper that he was freaking about because it put a small crack in his lip kit, then I was like what about that big ass scratch along his door. Opps guess he didn't know about the scratch cuz that really sent him over the edge on being upset. lol


Thanks for the responses so far!

Jason

 

Deep Scratches

A surface scratch that will `catch' your fingernail is approximately 0.04 Mil (1.0 µ) deep will usually require wet sanding (you should sand the scratch to bare metal because the device that caused this scratch was probably used with enough pressure to damage both the paint and the primer) and the clear coat refinishing

Removing a scratch requires removing the layer of paint that contains the defect; you need to level the paint to the lowest point of the scratch. Removing more that 0.5 mil (12µ) of clear coat will cause premature paint film failure as UV protection percolates to the top of the clear coat. Check paint film thickness with a Paint Thickness Meter (PTG) before you attempt to remove

As you go over a deep scratch, the abrasives round off the edges of the high spots of the scratch. The result is a shallower scratch (when no full correction can be made) rounded edges don’t reflect light the same way a sharp edge will and is therefore less noticeable.

It may be necessary to carry out some localized wet sanding to facilitate full removal of any deep scratches, once again, paint thickness must be checked, and if the paint is too thin wet sanding should not be considered

 

****Update****

So my in laws took the car to a local shop to get it fixed. So they did a few things while there. They repainted the drivers sided door, fixed a few deep scratches in his front lip (bumper) that he did while backing out of his garage, fixed a crack in the lip that was from hitting something on the freeway (same day as being keyed) plus a few lil dimple dents in the car.

So their grand total was around $800-850. But seeing it now, they didn't do a good job at paint matching the door, so it's going back to them on Monday for them to make it look right. Everything else looks good though.

 

That doesn't seem too bad at all for all the work they did.

 

No it doesn't, I have a scratch in the rear bumper that I'm wanting fixed and seeing how they fixed the scratch on him bumper I'm thinking of doing the same. Plus I have a ding in the front drivers side fender I want fixed too.

I'll have to get a quote from them fit mine too.

 

What shop?

 

A shop here in Tucson, I believe it's Dent Busters.