Malformed

Hello,

Registered to this forum a couple days ago and I am very glad that I did. Lots of useful information here!

So I've had my 1996 es300 for a couple of years now and it's always had pretty bad cracked paint.. Never really did much to stop it or anything just assumed that it was too late to fix. Lately, the paint in those spots has come completely off and rust is starting to form on those chipped spots. I feel I really need to address this issue now because rust can get serious pretty quick.

I'm not really sure what I should do at this point, though. My paint is in terrible condition (see pic) and now it's starting to rust. I thought about sanding down all of the rust spots and repainting those areas but at this point I think that for every one spot I fix, 2 more will pop up.

Is the only solution for me to fork out $1000+ for a new paint job? The car is probably only worth around $3000 so I'm not sure that would be a wise investment.. Should I attempt to sand down all of the rough spots and buff out all of the cracked paint and send it through a Maaco paint job for $500?

Just looking for any advice or recommendations. Let me know what you think.






What she looks like:

01LEXPL

iTrader: (10)

how much do you love this car?

I personally wouldn't bother. Maybe touch up the chips as they're only surface rust.

If you've lived with the ruined clear for two years - what's the point in 'investing' into the aesthetics now?

I'd keep driving it as-is and get something newer down the road. A grand is a grand that can be saved or spent elsewhere...

ErikTheRed

Painting the whole car (in a decent manner) will likely be quite a bit over $1000. That being said if everything else does what you want in the way you want, painting is probably less than the cost of replacing the whole vehicle. That's one of the things that irks me about these questions... it's not really about the value of the vehicle you have, it's about the cost of it's replacement, and any costs THAT car may lead to.
If you really like the car, get it painted, and get it done in a manner you are going to be happy with.. it's your car after all

Malformed

I came very close to selling the car and getting something newer. But I put in $1500 for repairs recently and it's only at around 130,000 miles. So I've decided to keep the car until its life is over. I started enjoying working on cars recently and am really interested in DIY projects and making the car look good and run well. I have alot of fix ups to do on this car, and this was one of the first ones I was going to try to tackle.. (or make a shop tackle ) I wasn't really into it before, that's why I didn't really keep up with it, but now I want to make it look great. Thanks for your advice.

Good point about it being about the cost of replacement and any costs it may lead to. I think the internals are in good shape and will last awhile without having to drop much money into it.. I'm going to have the car for awhile so I'm thinking that I might as well make it look nice. Hell, I was going to spend $13,000 on a newer car but since I've decided to keep it and save the money I think it will be okay to put down some money on this car to make it look nice.

With that said, how horrible are these Maaco paint jobs? I've heard bad things about them, but I've also heard you can save some money and get a decent paint job out of it if you do the prep work right. Any suggestions or advice?

Alexslexus

Each Maaco is different, some are better than others as they are franchises. However, most of them don't do very good prep work, nor do they disassemble the vehicle (such as door handles, mirrors, etc,) which leads to a lot of over spray. I also find that their color also doesn't really match the factory shade (it's usually a few shades lighter... which probably won't matter with white.) But, if you need a cheap paint job to at least make the car look decent and protect it for a few more years... they get the job done. You could certainly do worse, and pay more for it.

As for keeping the old car on the road vs. buying a new one, I usually always recommend fixing up the old one, so long as it's still reliable and the problems arent major. If the car starts breaking down on a regular basis and I can no longer trust it, It's time to let it go. But, if it's just normal wear/tear stuff and maintenance, save yourself the hefty debt of a large vehicle loan.

I don't know why people dwell on the value of the vehicle and don't want to spend more on it than it's worth... what is it worth to YOU?

01LEXPL

iTrader: (10)

I would never take it to a Maaco...

Look around on forums/Craigs in your area, there are a lot of backyard or 'off the clock' bodymen that do this in their spare time. Or even in their garages.

Paint work isn't 'hard' but the attention to detail is what makes/breaks a paintjob.

I've seen quite a few done out of DIY paint booths in garage settings with a small compressor come out great and as good as OEM [using OE colors].