How much does a decent paint job cost these days?

[toppstuff]

Old chap in the village passed away, bless him.

Know the family. I've been offered the chance to buy his old Rover 3500 P6. Its a nice old thing. Was restored about 10 years ago.

Rust is not really an issue, but it needs a decent respray.

I am happy to do the work removing the interior, windows, carpets, door cards etc, and deliver a rolling shell to a paint shop.

It has been a few years since I got my hards dirty, and so I have not a clue what a decent job would cost these days?

Would be good to know in advance so I can see how the man-maths works.

Thanks, chaps.

[MJK 24]

I think a decent job is going to cost £2,500 to £3,000 these days.

Concourse level perfection could be three times that. You’re paying for knowledge, skill and man hours. And there can be a huge amount of the latter in prep and final finishing.

[aeropilot]

MJK 24 said:

I think a decent job is going to cost £2,500 to £3,000 these days.

Depends where in the UK you are of course, but you'll be lucky to any change from £3k.

[Olivera]

MJK 24 said:

I think a decent job is going to cost £2,500 to £3,000 these days.

Concourse level perfection could be three times that. You’re paying for knowledge, skill and man hours. And there can be a huge amount of the latter in prep and final finishing.

Concours three times that? There was a thread recently on the Porsche forum here where people were sending 911s to OPC for a full respray... at £20k!

[MJK 24]

Olivera said:

MJK 24 said:

I think a decent job is going to cost £2,500 to £3,000 these days.

Concourse level perfection could be three times that. You’re paying for knowledge, skill and man hours. And there can be a huge amount of the latter in prep and final finishing.

Concours three times that? There was a thread recently on the Porsche forum here where people were sending 911s to OPC for a full respray... at £20k!

Are the OPC’s painting them in-house or subbing them out with a generous mark up? I can see a huge bill from an OPC if they’re stripping back to a bare shell, subbing out the paint and then rebuilding afterwards.

[MJK 24]

Painting 2/3rds of a Mercedes W124 to a high standard cost me £2k ish a few years back.

Plenty of photos to flick through:

https://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&...

[vpr]

I just don't know where you can get or what the standard of work is on a paint job costing 3k

Decent paint and materials alone must come close to a grand.

[mph]

Why does it need a paint job if it was restored 10 years ago ?

If it's the original paint, there's no corrosion anywhere ,you do all of the stripping down yourself and you don't mind the new paint on top of the old, then I guess you might find someone to blow it over for the £3k price.

If it's been painted before and you don't take it back to bare metal then you're throwing £3k down the drain.

[classicaholic]

I agree about stripping the paint off & have done it a few times, I have stripped & dipped in the past but not had a blast yet, I have had a good rub down but that left marks that showed after.

What does everyone recommend - have a shabby body that really needs sorting over the winter!

[theadman]

I spent ages researching where to send my car for painting. A bodyshop was recommended by a friend and I duly delivered a fully stripped rolling shell. The paint was poor and covered from one end to the other in microblistering.

Rather than dip the shell it was agreed that the best course of action was to strip the paint by hand so we could tackle any issues uncovered one step at a time. There was quite a lot to do, as there always is. The car had pounds of filler in it and rot around the windscreen which needed refabricating.

The bill for this was £7.5k, but taken to one of the well known 'specialists' I suspect it would have been double.



In finding this picture to post, I'm shocked to discover it was late 2011! Based on this, I doubt you could have a car prepped and resprayed to a really good standard for £2,500 to £3,000. It's surprising how many hours go into the preparation prior to painting. Cutting corners at this stage always shows in the end result.

[POORCARDEALER]

If a "standard size " vehicle is stripped down and rolled into a bodyshop, needing nothing more than paint prep there is no reason for it to cost more than 2500-3000 for a very decent job, in fact it should be cheaper than that IMO, however most vehicles will need quite a bit more prep than that. (ive just paid £5.5K for a Mk2 jaguar shell doing which was totally bare but needed repairs to the metal and the bolt on panels gapping)

Something to think about....insurance companies are paying bodyshops around £30 an hour for accident repairs and painting, so if you can assertain how long it will take that should give you an idea on labour

[P5BNij]

OP - are you changing the colour or sticking with the original? All seventeen body panels (including the roof) can be unbolted from the car and painted separately, away from the base unit, if the paint in the door shuts is ok and you're not changing the colour you could have all the panels painted individually.

[toppstuff]

P5BNij said:

OP - are you changing the colour or sticking with the original? All seventeen body panels (including the roof) can be unbolted from the car and painted separately, away from the base unit, if the paint in the door shuts is ok and you're not changing the colour you could have all the panels painted individually.

Its mustard yellow. I am happy to keep it that way. Do not know the type very well, so had no idea just unbolting panels is an option.

Before proceeding, methinks a thorough inspection is a good idea to see how much prep may be needed and to check for hidden nasties.

I understand that what may be a simple freshen-up job on top of original paint, could turn into a lot more work. Time to walk over with a home made cake and chat with the owners I think.

[P5BNij]

toppstuff said:

P5BNij said:

OP - are you changing the colour or sticking with the original? All seventeen body panels (including the roof) can be unbolted from the car and painted separately, away from the base unit, if the paint in the door shuts is ok and you're not changing the colour you could have all the panels painted individually.

Its mustard yellow. I am happy to keep it that way. Do not know the type very well, so had no idea just unbolting panels is an option.

Before proceeding, methinks a thorough inspection is a good idea to see how much prep may be needed and to check for hidden nasties.

I understand that what may be a simple freshen-up job on top of original paint, could turn into a lot more work. Time to walk over with a home made cake and chat with the owners I think.

Mustard yellow - sounds like it's either almond yellow or turmeric yellow and from that I'd guess it's probably a 1971 - 77 Series 2 model. As well as the more obvious easily removable panels like the doors, bonnet and bootlid, the outer sills, roof, C pillar covers (finished in black or brown vinyl on Series 2 cars), front and rear scuttles and front and rear valances are all bolted onto the base unit. The hardest panel to remove is the roof as I think it will have been sealed all the way round in the factory (might be wrong on that though), the others are all fairly straightforward.

Is it a manual or an auto...? Manual V8s are sought after, some of them have replacement gearboxes from the SD1 which seems to handle the torque of the V8 better than the factory 'boxes.

Photos would help if you get the chance...

Edited by P5BNij on Sunday 30th September 17:03

Edited by P5BNij on Sunday 30th September 17:04

[anonymous-user]

It's fairly simple to unbolt all the external panels as suggested especially if it was restored fairly recently. You could then quite feasibly strip them down to metal yourself or just get that done. A nice winter project. Remember the bonnet and boot are aluminium. You may unearth some horrors, the wings rust rampantly and many pattern wings don't fit too well so the old ones may have been patched up. For a quick check on the base unit condition pull out the rear seat squabs (there are no fixings) and look under the sound deadening in the corners. Also, the sill covers are just cosmetic and screw on, what's underneath is what matters.

If you go ahead and need wings I have a used set of wings that I believe to be Rover originals that I took off a 2200 that was being scrapped many years ago. They'd only been on a year before the car was scrapped due to base unit rust so are in good condition, minor surface rust only. They've been in my roof space for the last 15 years or so.

[grumpy52]

I would certainly go down the panel removal route on that model , being restored 10 years ago is no guarantee that the base unit is not full of rot .
£3K is cheap for a decent respray.
Much will depend on the prep work required and what many regard as acceptable such as loads of filler / primer filler coats etc will fail after a couple of years , also the materials used must be compatible and not cheap mixtures of thinners , primers , poorly maintained compressors and filters etc .
This is the difference between a cheap job and a proper job .
I have been spoilt by working alongside some excellent bodyshop people over the years and recognise the difference between a proper job and a 10 meter job .

[lowdrag]

It really does depend where you go and what part of the country you are in. When I built the C-type I was rather constricted in my choice by the builders, but when the E-type came to be rebuilt in 2014 the bill was £2,000 all in. Today, I doubt that anywhere does it for under £5,000 for a good job.