Minor Body Damage, Advice Needed

[minimonster17]

My 96 Taurus has got a crease in the driver's side fender and a ding in the driver side passenger door. The damage isnt bad enough to take to a collision shop, but is enough to really bother me. I have already tried a suction cup, which failed due to the round nature of the fender and door. A plunger moderately fixed the door ding. I also tried beating the damage out from the inside with a hammer, with some sucess. Does anybody have any suggestions for a paintless repair?

[denisb]

I've seen a guy working for a compny called The Dent Wizzard. He was very reasonable for price and he does stufflike hail storm damadge. He uses a wheel type unit from the inside of the body panel and stretches the dent back out.

Denis

[giddyup50]

Did you have any luck w/the suction cup at all? How about the plunger was it the basic red plunger or the heavy duty black one? I have a dent on the curve of the door. Bought the car new in 03 and two weeks later my wife came home and the door was like that. I was so pissed, luckily it didn't scratch the paint. I would try the paintless dent removal guys but they would drill a hole in the side of the door to get the tool in behind the dent.

[denisb]

Originally Posted by giddyup50

I would try the paintless dent removal guys but they would drill a hole in the side of the door to get the tool in behind the dent.

Not true, he takes the apolstery off the door and goes in from behind. He uses pry with a roller on the end of it and keeps rolling it on the back side of the panel using pressure and continuous back and forth movements. He uses a mirror to see when the dent finaly comes out. As long as the paint isn't cracked or scratched off you will barely notice if you notice the dent at all. These guys do excellent work. You've got to see them work to beleive the outcome.

Here's a link to their site http://www.dentwizard.com/. They do show the repair, but it doesn't do justice to watching these guys in action.

Denis

[Willyum]

I have had two dents out from Dent Doctor type folks. The first I called them directly and they charged $150 for one dent. The next time I went thru the Ford dealership body shop and he charged $50, what he charges the shop. If you've already fooled with it, you may have screwed it up.

[denisb]

Willyum has a point. If you took a hammer to the back side of it, it's possible the dent will be harder to push back out.

[giddyup50]

I used to work at a Ford dealership and they had their own dent guy and I have watched him do many dent repairs and I do agree that sometimes they can take the door card off but other times there might be something in the way with the window or locks and that would be a case where he would have to drill a hole in the side then put a rubber plug in the hole when he was done. I haven't touched the dent yet, I think I will leave that up to him. Thanks.

[InsigniaDelta]

I did paintless dent removal for a little while at a Toyota dealership.

I now work at a Chrysler, Dodge, Jeep dealership, unfortunately, and we don't have the stuff for me to do that anymore. I do work with major scratch repair. We get a hold of Dent Wizard to get most of our dings out, unless they're bad enough to send out to a body shop.

The vast majority of it is done as denisb explained, although yes, sometimes it becomes necessary to drill a small hole, although it's usually a matter of it being such a pain in the ass that it's going to cheaper for the customer to do it that way. Just see what Dent Wizard can do. If the paint is damaged slightly, you'd be surprised what you can do with some matching touch-up paint, some sandpaper (1000-1600 grit), and various compounds, you won't be able to tell.

As far as not getting a hole drilled, have them look at it, or even take it to them, tell them if they have to drill, not to do it, simple as that.

Good luck.