Paintless dent repair drivers side rear panel question
 

So, someone decided to open up their car door and put a dent on the rear drivers side panel just above the rear tire. I've gotten paintless dent repair done on previous cars with great results. But, just curious can this be done on this part of the 370z? How are they going to gain access behind the panel? It's my understanding that the panel is welded on. I'll try attaching a picture of the dent later today.

I have seen some banged up 370's repaired via paint-less methods in places that I would have thought impossible to access. I hold high hopes for you. I send curses to the villain who dented your beauty. I will stick an extra pin in my "unnamed inconsiderate driver" voodoo doll tonight for you.

Had paintless dent repair done on my old G35 Coupe. The parts of the car they couldn't access with their magic rods, they used their sticky tape method to pull it out. The guy did a very good job.

I have one in the same area.

Wonder how much it costs to get this done? I've never had it done before.

Haha, thanks. I'll eventually talk to a body shop and post what they say.
I use to have a 350Z and got a dent in the same panel and they said they couldn't access it. They ended up drilling a hole to be able to access the area behind the dent. They did good work but I really don't want to have a hole drilled and plugged again. There's got to be another way.

The guy who did mine charged me $75 per ding (and came to my home), I had 2 bad ones.

He could reach one with his special rods. The other one, he said he could attempt to drill inside the rear wheel well so the plug wont be seen, but wasn't sure he could reach it even if he did that and I'd have to remove the tire also.

Option 2 was to use the glue method (I posted sticky tape in my earlier post but it was a glue). He places the glue in the ding, then places a tool (actually several different sizes, that I can't describe) on the glue and pulls it gently. He did this several times and just like magic, the dent was gone. The danger to this method is the paint may come off if the glue is too strong and he pulls too hard. However, the guy I had was very experienced, steady handed and not in any rush when pulling. I was very happy with the job.

I did go to two shops to get quotes that did paintless dent repairs but wanted $125 per ding. Hope this helps.

Had a small crease (either a manufacturing defect or shipping damage) I noticed right after delivery, in the same fender area. The dent guy declined to do it on such a new and beautiful car. Said it was too high risk to do those repairs in that area of the car. I appreciated his honesty. My small defect was hardly visible. Actually, I don't think even I could find it now. Glad I left well enough alone. Be cautious.

Can't they just take the rear tire off and the wheel well lining and get to it?

They say such repairs in that are a of our cars are way more complicated than that. Second opinion concurred.

Great... I would think you'd be able to access it after taking the wheel and fender off

if there are two people, yes...but would be very inefficient.

PDR is done using visual reflection of the metal to guide. some use light guides, some just use brickwall or anything with a line.

That makes more sense, thanks

Man I really wish we had a PDR company in guam :(

Seems like a good business idea out here,

you should train yourself and make a business out of it?

i spent about $3K on training and tools. took about a year of daily practice to get a real handle of things. i can fix most dings..but i dont do it for business as i know how to make a lot more money working at an office sipping on coffee, not having to sweat my balls off in the summer heat. :D

Sounds like a good idea :tup: did you go thru a class or just on hand experience?

Maybe I can use it as a sideline for the extra cash

i took a training course, then worked on used cars as an intern.
then from there been fixing dings on my own to fix my own cars when i do encounter it. :shakes head:

ive fixed home appliance dings, dings in some decorative container cans, decorative trash cans, anything metal or plastic that needs finess. :icon17: my wife even gave me a pizza pan to fix when UPS bent it out of shape. lol

it's handy to know how to read bends.

Here's some pics.

Also, what do you guys think about wheel repair where they don't take off the rim and just mask the area around it? I'm a little concerned about that, and would prefer that take the wheel off incase of over spray...

I myself am a dent guy. During Hail seasons I travel around the world (Australia and Europe) and chase hail storms and do jobs mostly through insurance agencies and do local dealerships when its not in hail season. kenchan is right those tools aren't cheap! You can mostly get anywhere on a car except for rails or dog legs. Darli328 that isn't to bad of a ding. If it was me working on that dent the best thing to do is to take out the tail light and stick a long rod down there, and if its too tight of a space the I would probably use a special tool called a Whale Tail to get in that tight place.

i would just use the rear tire as a pivot point and push it out from the rear arch.

i think it can be repaired to about 98-99%. difficult to do over decorative lines.

Went to my dent guy today. He tried his best to pull it out with hot glue but most of the dent is still there. He also thinks taking off the tail light might be too far from the dent and he's not sure if there's even a way to get to the area behind the dent from the tail light. What do you guys think about that? Can you access the back of the panel from the tail light?
He also said I have another option. He could take tire/wheel off and wheel liner and try to access the area behind the dent that way. Does anyone know if there's a way to access that area without drilling? My dent guy said worse case he could take the wheel and wheel liner off and drill a hole behind the plastic liner to gain access to the area behind the dent. I really don't want to drill but that sounds like my only option, and at least the hole would be behind the wheel liner. Any thoughts?

lol@ glue pull. find yourself another PDR tech.

i wouldn't even consider glue puller for that part of the car cause it wont do shitt. you need to access it from the wheel well. if there is no direct access, the tech will drill a hole on the inner panel of the well, push out the metal, and just plug it with a plastic plug. at least it's not on the passenger side where he'd have to worry about the gas filler piping.

access from taillamp will require drilling too since there's really no access hole that i remember when i did the rear camera /fog lamp install that the tool can fit.

What about taking the rear bumper off? Is that an option? Or, what about taking off the interior trunk trim pieces. Any hope of accessing it that way? I really don't want to drill, and am considering leaving the dent if drilling is the only option.
What's wrong with the glue pull? Is there a better way of pulling the dent out?
Lastly the tech said he could try to make the dent bigger and my get lucky with being able to pull it out completely. He did say that is very risky and could crack the paint.

glue pull will never get the amount of force needed to bend that part of decorative lines in the metal. if it did, the paint would crack off (seriously).

glue pull is good for non-aluminum hoods, roofs, trunk lids, some side panels where there is no access from behind. i use glue pullers as last resort as it is very time consuming unless i have to do hail damage.

removing the rear bumper will not gain access to that area. you might be able to access if you took the trunk liner out, but the tech probably can't monitor the metal while he's pushing it out so it would only work to see where a tool can be fed behind the metal while the tech access it from the wheelwell.

this is why im saying he needs to drill the wheel well to gain access if there is no direct access from inside the wheel arch.

definitely dont make the dent bigger. that's a single impact dent, right? making it bigger will just make it that much harder to bend it back especially on decorative lines.

also check your area (or your dealer) for mobile touchup places. the good ones can match your paint very well. spot bondo, sand, and paint. these folks fix used cars that can't be repaired efficiently by PDR.

Call me crazy but I don't want to drill, and that's the only reason why the tech tried a glue pull. He said we could try it but it probably won't work. I'd much rather take the interior trim pieces off or anything else over drilling and/or painting. I guess what I'm asking is, is there any way to gain access to that part of the car without drilling? Even if I can't get the dent completely out I'd rather have it somewhat fixed without drilling. I get what you're saying about how the tech needs to be able to see what he's doing with regards to working the metal. I still think I'd rather try my luck with any option that doesn't require drilling/painting first.

Do you have any experience with removing the tail light? Can you access the area in question from there? Seems kind of far, maybe 2 or more feet away.

see service manual BRM page 32 rear fender hemming process.

then you'll see wat im talking about. you need to drill a small hole inside the wheel well to gain access. even if you remove the tail lamp you wont gain access, and even if you drilled the metal behind the tail lamp, you still wont gain access. :D

btw, drilling an access hole is common practice in PDR.

since you told your tech not to drill, then yah, there is no way he can fix that ding. i wont be able to fix it either without drilling. :)

if you can overcome that fear, he can probably fix it to about 98-99% if he's willing to take the time.
he would then either use silicon glue or plug. it's no big deal really. get a cup of coffee if you can't stand watching. :icon17:

Seriously, thanks for all your help/advise. I know I sound like the customer from hell. I've had some bad experiences in the past with drilling and I really hate those plugs... I'm not sure what I'm going to do but in all honesty I'd rather leave the dent than drill in the fender well. I'll admit I may consider drilling behind the tail light, but as you said that's not really an option so I guess I'll live with the dent. Thanks for the info with the manual, I'll take a look at it and show to the tech and see if we can come up with any ideas. Please let me know if you can think of any other ideas.

^^ np, GL! :tup:

Btw, what's a Whale Tail?

it's a pdr tool that looks like a whale tail at the end. i use it mostly for tight space or to remove glue/sealants behind the doors, etc.

http://dkpdrtools.com/ebay_images/WTL8TIP_6000.jpg

Interesting, and thanks again!

Two ideas I had that probably won't work but wanted to see if anyone had some thoughts. Can the silver door hook be removed or is it welded on? Looks like it has special screws to me but I'm pretty much a noob here. If so, would that be a viable option to gain access to the rear panel area.
Also, what about the rubber/plastic trim just above the door handle and in front of the pretty much useless rear side window? Obviously I don't know much about PDR or how big the tools are. But, looks to me those plastic clips in question can be removed but I'm not sure if you can get access anywhere from there.

Tried searching for BRM service manual and/or service manual with no real luck. However I did find some links to buy a digital copy off of Nissan's website... I also skimmed through my owners manual to find anything on the area in question. I guess I'm just not ready to give up yep. Sorry, drilling in the fender well is something I don't want to do. I'm starting to wondering, is the area completely sealed? I would imagine there's an opening somewhere. And, thanks again for your patients with this.

Both of my front fenders, rear quarter panel, trunk lid, and door were PDR'd. I should get the car back this Monday. I dropped by to peek at it in the paint booth, and it looks very good. The tech was able to fix the nasty hail damage on the body line of the fender.

download the entire service manual here:

http://www.the370z.com/nissan-370z-o...-download.html

then look at the BRM p32.

digi-good to hear your car's coming along. :tup:

the front fender should be pretty easy as there's only the plastic liner to peel back. the rear quarter has a layer of metal that blocks access to the arch area so a bit more tricky to gain access. that's why darli's PDR guy couldn't fix his because darli does not want the tech to drill an access hole. :)

Thanks! I'm going crazy without the car. In fact, most of the dents weren't popped out, but the tech filled it in and sanded it down smooth. The fenders and roof were painted on the car, and the door was removed prior to painting.

Is there anywhere else to drill besides in the fender well? What about removing interior trim pieces? Someone mentioned behind the tail light might be an option...

Yea when there is a crease that sharp on the body line its pointless to glue pull, cause your gonna risk pinching the dent shut and thats gonna make it even harder to get out. On quarter panels theres no access unless its a bmw or mercedes cause they have secret plugs in the quarter well. Im about 99% sure that if you take out the tail light and stick a ultra thin whale tail you could easily get it out. Theres no access under trim or bumper. I would take the tailight out like i said before and stick a long ultra thin whale tail. if that doesnt work last resort is to beat the dent out. what i mean by this is to beat to the sides of the crease. of course its gonna make the dent bigger, but its also gonna make the dent less sharp. your basicly gonna make the dent more shallow and soft do you can stick a glue tab on it and pull it up. theres no way to just stick a glue tab on that sharp of a dent.

this is the company i work for, its just me and my boss.
heres the link if you want to take a look at some of our work.

Welcome to Dentmagix

heres a pic of a ultra thin whale tail.
uk/d21.htmlhttp://denttoolcompany.nl/contents/en-uk/d21.html

its long so you can stick it right through the tail light hole with nothing in your way. make sure he tries with the tail light out. sometimes i get lazy myself and try and do it with the tail light in, takes twice as long and doesn't come out perfect.

Sorry for the response!