Should you DIY or Take it to a Shop?

It isn’t a fun moment when you spot rust or a chip in your vehicle’s paint.

The question becomes do you touch it up yourself or take it to a shop?

For some people who may not feel confident in their skills to touch up paint themselves it is a non-issue, they take it in for repair. However if you feel you have the know-how or desire to touch up paint yourself there are a few tips to consider before taking on the job.

Rust, Scratch or Chip. What are you touching up?

Handling rust versus a chip or scratch can be a very different process.

Small scratches and chips, when dealt with immediately can be easy to fix and cost effective.

The DIY approach is a three-step process; clean the surface of the vehicle, apply the perfectly matched paint colour, and seal with a topcoat.

Rust or deep scratches are more complicated to fix. They may require filling the scratch or dent, priming the metal, and applying multiple coats of paint.

Determining the severity of damage may alter your decision to DIY or take it to a shop.

Check the Warranty

Do you have a warranty on your vehicle? If so check it, you may find that if you have purchased it within a certain time period, rust repair and spot treatment is covered, in which case it’s best to take it in to a shop for repair.

Paint Matching

When opting to touch up the paint on your vehicle yourself, one of the trickiest steps can be determining your vehicles paint colour and matching it perfectly to touch up paint.

This is key if you are touching up paint yourself, as miss-matched colour looks obvious.

There are websites available such as Duplicolor that colour match based on year, make and model of vehicle. That is a good place to start to figure out what paint colour you need.

Every vehicle manufacturer indicates the vehicle exterior paint colour by a code on the vehicle identification tag. This code can be found on different places on your vehicle depending on the year, make and model.

You can contact your local dealership to find out where the vehicle identification tag is located.

For a quick resource look online for various paint-matching guides. There is one put out by Duplicolor, as referred to above.

At All Makes Collision Centre we use a paint gun that scans the paint colour and provides a specific recipe of how to create that exact colour, so no matter what your vehicle colour, we can make it.

Once we get a read out of what quantities of which paint colours to use we add them into our paint mixing machines. If one colour is even slightly off the machine re-calibrates the quantities of the other colours needed to create the perfect blend to match your vehicles unique paint colour.

Where to buy touch up paint in Calgary

Touch up paint can be purchased from your automotive dealership. Paint is also available at Canadian Tire or Part Source.

Purchasing from Canadian Tire or Part Source is the most economical, however may not guarantee a perfect paint match. Do your homework first and go in knowing the exact colour you need for most optimal match.

Purchasing touch up paint from the dealership will give you a better chance of a good paint match, but will cost more money.

Ultimately for the best possible quality of job take your vehicle to a shop or dealership.

Shops, such as All Makes Collision Centre are skilled and proficient so not only will the job be done properly, it will be done quickly as well saving you time in the long run.

If you would like a quote on your specific job give us a call. Check out our info on our car painting service page for more information.