Question Regarding Paintings... FML...
 

Hello Guys,

So couple years back, I think around 2011, I had an incident where a uhal scrapped the front of my bumper and my headlight. At the time I took it to a Mexican Auto Paint Shop in LA and I believe they painted over the damaged areas. So for a while everything looked good.

However maybe around a year ago, I can definitely noticed that it was bit off. What I mean by that is that the area that were painted over were definitely less shiny when compared to an area that hadn't been painted over.

And today I got a car wash and as I was wiping down the water with a yellow micro fiber towel, I noticed some of the paints were coming (more of peeling little by little) off... I knew this because my yellow towel had black specs all over...

Any advice at this point?

My original intention was to get one of the aftermarket fiber glass front bumper and paint it over but now I'm bit worried that since it's made out of different material when compared to a stock bumper, it might look a lot different and I'm bit worried that it won't be as shiny when compared to other parts of the car... Or is this something that I should not worry about when getting a fiberglass bumper? Btw my car color is black cherry, if anyone's wondering...

Anyone have any experience with aftermarket bumpers and painting them over? How do they come out? When compared to other stock parts, are they identical or can you tell a difference?

I will post some pictures later.

Any advice would be appreciated...

Thank you,
Jay

Why wouldn't you just respray the stock bumper? Unless you want a body kit there's no need to replace it. I'd just get it done correctly.

There are two ways to do paint; the right way and the wrong way. The right way involves stripping down to the bare metal (or plastic, in your case), doing body work, priming, guide coat, wet-sanding, painting, clearing, wet-sanding in at least 3 stages, and then buffing (also 3 stages). Unfortunately not many shops are going to go to the trouble of doing it right. And if they do it's going to cost you.

Material won't matter in the slightest... unless the paint shop sucks. And there are a lot of them who suck.

Thank you for your response.

The reason why I want to get a new bumper is because of this... Couple years ago, I hit a tumbleweed on the freeway... Is this possible to repair? If it is, I might just repair it...

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y94...l/IMG_7691.jpg

Are those just chips? If so all of that will go away the second the bumper is stripped. Unless the plastic is actually split I'd keep it stock... of course if you want an aftermarket body kit now's the time.

Beware though. If your shop is any good then your repainted bumper will be much flatter (no orange peel) and better looking than the rest of your car. Most people wouldn't notice things like that, but I do. Nissan paint is sh*t quality straight from the factory.:shakes head:

Yeah, just chips. How much you think this would cost to repair? And when I say repair, I mean repaint as well?

I think for most bumpers and at most shops it's usually starting around $500.

Sounds about right.