Paint Specialist

[M3_DM]

I have a bit of an issue with my car at the moment whereby its gone into a dealership and I'm pretty sure its had paintwork done to it. Are there any paint specialists about with the ability to tell me if the paint on the suspect area is new??

Much appreciated

[supercarambler]

Most decent paintshops should be able to tell. Also you can try and get a paint thickness tester. Basically its reads the paint depth in microns and running the reader across the paintwork you can see any major fluctuations.

I too had a similar experience on a used car I bought and found a bodyshop who measured it, also I threatened to get an independant report from Glasurit Paints (You may have to pay for this)and they kindily rectified the problem.

Ring around a few paint shops and ask if they have a thickness gauge (the larger ones normally do especially dealer franchises)

Good luck

[M3_DM]

What is that report all about? I really need someone to confirm that the paint has been applied in the last fortnight. Not exactly sure how they'd go about doing that but with modern technology im sure there must be a way

[Drive 'n' Shine]

Might be worth asking Peter from http://www.eclipse-auto-valet.co.uk/aboutus.html here a call (hes in Swansea), and ask if he can do a paint depth reading for you, most cars that haven't had any paintwork done will show fairly consistant readings all over, any paintwork carried out will be immeadiately highlighted with higher readings. Its a fairly quick and straight forward process.

HTH

[Anatol]

A thickness gauge won't tell the OP if the paintwork is new, just that there's been a refinish there at some point. It might have been there for a while and he's only just noticing it, now that he's 'looking for it'...

The bad news is, some finishes (e.g.UV-cured) are completely inert and set once baked. They don't do any more off-gassing or curing once they come out from under the lights. By now some rapid cure iso's will have done the same. Some slower-curing finishes might be off-gassing, or not completely cured but testing for that isn't a standard process, and proving it would likely involve damaging the finish.

If I were in your shoes, I'd ring up with the "I'm about to get the car detailed, and the detailer has told me if there's any fresh paint on it, it will be horrendously damaged by his process, so I'm just ringing up to check you didn't do any repairs or touch-ups on the car while you had it, did you?" story and watch them (if guilty) start to get flustered...

Tol

[cartoons]

no offence intended but if you think it`s had paintwork any skilled bodyworker will be able to tell just by looking.i haven`t seen a job yet that was as original.there are always clues.take it to a good bodyshop and they`ll tell you.just try to make sure it`s not the one that possibly repaired it!!

[Anatol]

Again, that doesn't help the OP (unless his car is brand new). If the car has a few years on it, finding out that a patch has been repaired *at some point* is of no use to him - he needs to be able to determine that the repair is fresh, not just that there is a repair.

Tol