vedaan

Hello,

My wife went to pick up my kids and came home to find that someone had scratched the left side of the rear bumper and of course no note. They are 3-6 inch long (1/4 inch) wide scratches (see pic). Need help to see how I can get those fixed. The paint is riviera red and one of the indy shop I went to earlier today quoted me $600 + tax. He mentioned that they would need to take the bumper out and fix it. also that the paint is very costly. Its really sad to see the sore spot on such a beautiful car.

Has anyone had to repaint the bumper and what was the price that was paid. I can also look at calling my insurance company and take it to the dealer, but that's still a $500 co-pay and not sure if the rates get bumped-up after that.

I'm in central jersey - any recommendations on a indy body shop?

Appreciate all your help.

Thanks

SW17LS

Plenty of good shops out there, no need to worry about the dealer. That approach is right, and the cost is about right.

SlangBlade

Depending on what they charge you, you might be able to get a new bumper, painted, for less from Sewell Lexus. I don't know what they would charge for shipping though?

SW17LS

You also wouldn't be guaranteed it would match.

TonyCarson

Working at an auto-body shop for my younger adult life I can say that Lexus paint is extremely difficult to match for most shops. I agree that depending on price, it might be best to get from Sewell and sell the damaged one.

I can't believe people do this kind of stuff, especially to such a beautiful expensive looking car...and not even leave a note. My Z was hit and ran at the mall, thank goodness for good Samaritans who got their plate.

SW17LS

You do realize that all Sewell does is paint a bumper cover in their body shop and ship it out right? They don't come from Lexus painted. He's much better off having the cover he has repaired, blended and repainted.

TonyCarson

I see, I am new to the Lexus community. My perception, from what people have wrote about Sewell, was that it was a company of Lexus perhaps. My apologies.

SW17LS

No Sewell is just a Lexus dealership in Dallas, TX that has made a business of selling parts online. Not to knock them, they're great, but the issue with ordering something like a bumper painted off of the car is that body shops tint color to match the specific vehicle that the bumper is being replaced on. If you just paint a panel using the color code without doing that, it won't match because there are numerous variations and tints of every factory color, and unless they have the car to tint it to, it won't match as well as it could in the hands of the right pros.

For a repair like that also they will only repair and color coat the damaged area, and blend the paint into the rest of the existing paint on the bumper. This will make it even easier to match that paint because the 97% of the bumper that isn't damaged will only have to be clearcoated.

praetor

$600 isn't a bad price. I had to have a scratch fixed last winter when my car slid on ice scratching the rear quarter panel. It ended up costing me $700+ performed by the dealer. SF Pearl white is very hard to do and it took them two tries to get it right. The first time was just carelessness by the painter. They missed a scratch and I spotted some dimples in the paint.

Like SW13GS stated, the paint has to be custom blended. The paint on your car won't look like fresh paint out of the can as paint slowly fades over time. Depending on how much fading, they can't just paint your bumper, they may have to blend it into the surrounding panels as well.

SW17LS

Even brand new and unfaded it will be tinted differently depending on the run

silguy

it's either unmatched new paint, or the scratch. I'd take the new paint IMO. May I suggest you leaving it? I hate to say this, but chances are there will be more scratches. This happens way too often and people don't leave a note because they don't want to fix it. If an idiot hits your car, that same idiot isn't going to fix their mistake. I've had plenty of those to my car and in the end, the only thing I can do is get pissed off and leave it alone. I can't fork up 600$ every time someone does this. Sad. So what I've decided to do is wait, maybe 5-6 years and then try to fix all the body defects throughout the year. I've had my car for about 1.5 years and theres already about 10 small dents, scratches here and there and bird dropping residue all over that i can point out.

SW17LS

I wouldn't leave that on a car personally. If you're careful you can certainly keep a car in good shape. Little scratches and chips and such are one thing, touch them up as best you can, but waiting 5-6 years and driving a beat up car for that time doesn't make sense to me.

If that damage were lower down on the bumper and could be touched up and buffed/wetsanded that would be one thing, but thats something that needs to be repaired if it were my car.

The paint can absolutely be matched, you just have to find a good shop that can do it.

99alta

I've had a few of those, last one was one of those Home Depot flat carts that someone shoved into the car and left it

In any case my advice would be to get JUST the bumper repainted if it can be done. Don't let them suck you into blending the paint into the metal parts of the body.
I prefer to leave the metal untouched if possible, as original paint should hold better than a repainted surface.
My thought is that the plastic painted surfaces always look a little different than the metal surfaces anyway.

SW17LS

Should not need to blend into the quarter panels for this. There's a little damage to the edge of the rear quarter, I would have that buffed and touched up instead of having that panel painted.

rjm

I had a similar incident. Hit and run while parked in a parking lot. Check your insurance policy. My policy has a much lower deductible ($250) for a hit and run accident. Total cost (before deductible) for mine was around $550. My body shop matches the paint exactly with a computer so it's just about impossible to see any difference in finishes.