Yep. It also requires you to really know how or you will kill the paint.

 

I still am just stunned by this. "S-class paint isn't BAD at all compared to the MAYBACH." I'm not a paint expert by any means and for all I know I was wrong, but my gut/tastes told me that was awful and I guess I was right.

Steve's paint color, the metallic hides it and it is beautiful but yep I see the orange peel there too but it's not nearly as evident.

Mercedes used to have paint jobs that were so deep you could reach into them it seemed. I was around lots of all black W140s when they were brand new years ago, the paint was stunning. The paint on my '02 SL is stunning.

I don't have the money for a $200,000 SUV but I absolutely wouldn't buy that one based on that awful paint job alone.

 

very few people have the financial ability to do that

 

I wouldn't say "very few" but no, it's not the norm.

 

OK...but that sure looks like a row of about 4 or 5 parallel inch-long scratches to me. But if you say they aren't...then fine.

 

Looks like a light fixture (or several) to me.

 

Since owning a home with a garage I have found that fluorescent lighting really makes a good paint job pop out.

 

Its as bad as that in some places.

I would never pay cash for a car, has nothing to do with financial ability, it just doesn’t make sense for me to take capital out of things that go up in value to put it into something that declines in value. If I had money just lying around doing nothing that would be a different story

Its the reflection of the light fixture, no scratches!

 

How do I fix this? It's courtesy of someone that decided to park behind me one day.
There is no paint transfer as far as I can tell. Just that imprint I can't wipe off. The rest of the car is dirty cuz winter.

 

Start with washing the car off properly, use a decontamination foam spray that pulls irons and tar off. Then run your hand over the surface and see if it feels smooth or not, clay it if there are still embedded contaminants. Wash it again, then inspect the damaged area for scratch depth, if the plastic has been deformed or not relative to the other side, and if anything catches your fingernail.

If no to the above use a light polishing compound and slowly work the viable scratches out, then move to fine and ultra fine finishing compounds and spread out from the center to about a half foot in all directions to even the paint gloss.

If the plastic is deformed or badly scratched you will need to heat gun it and try to coax it back to being the correct shape, bad scratches can be filled but now you are getting into paint and a more skill intensive fix.

 

Thats easily repaired, it likely wont be perfect, but it will be 90%. If you don't want to tackle it yourself, any detailer can handle that,

 

Check this out, that generation Maxima with Historic tags. I am so old...

 

SL:



Needs a CC.

 

oh boy........

 

The gen before it is better.

I'm sure everyone is aware but the Maxima is another car to bite the dust, though it became irrelevant to me the second they dropped the CVT in yearrrrrs ago.

Maximas were excellent, excellent, highly desirable cars at one time.