When a Car is Fixed After an Accident, Is It Okay?? I'm Worried..

[solaris=amazing]

Okay about a week and a half ago, i was turning onto a big road, and a 63 year old women drove past her red light, and hit me in a in my front left wheel area at around a solid 30mph. Now i got a witness, and even the police could tell she was in the wrong 100%. Her "rented" 2004 dodge neon was declared totalled by enterprise rental-completly trashed. Now my car, a 95 ford thunderbird 4.6 WAS in mint condition. The damage is basically from my entire wheel area-to the bumper. The body shop, and i love the car-it's worth fixing. Cost of repair is just about $2000 dollars. From the looks of it, part or whole of the rack and pinion, tie rod, spring, front left panel/fender and bumper cover have to be replaced. Now my question is this, don't these shops HAVE to make sure everything is SAFE afterwards, with tests and stuff?? I wanna make sure i don't get it back, and there are knocks here and there when i steer the car. They said they are gonna color match the paint to the car-which i hope goes well, and most likely paint part of the door-to sorta blend in. Do they use cheap ass paint you think?? The main thing here is that i just want it to be in the shape it was before the accident. BTW, the wheel that was actually hit, is literally unscafed. Only one little scratch from her license plate.

PS.. Lots of people tell me once a car is in an accident, and is fixed, that it's never the same-thats got me bummed. This shop had several high end cars in the lot to-waiting to be fixed. There was even a Z06 getting the front end done up-so it's probably a good shop.

[solaris=amazing]

Forgot to mention, the car has no damage to the engine/tranny or any working parts-except of coarse the steering.

[eckoman_pdx]

It's really hard to tell over the net without being there to look at it, how "safe" fixing it is.

I have seen cars that had no bussiness being "repaired" get "fixed" and cars that could have been repaired fairly easy get "totaled."

However, how safe the repair is unlimitly depends on the body shop diing the work. First, are they using qaulity new OEM parts, used junkyard or aftermarket replacement "OEM Style" parts. Secondly, it depends on how much care is taken. I have seen qaulity repairs that really were fine, and others that looked "fine" to the average eye but were really unsafe reapirs I wouldn't want to drive. I have seen "body shops" try and fix cars the bondo and patch panel method (BAD!!!) and it looks "fine" to the average person on the street, but it's far from that.

How safe it is really depends on the qaulity of the shop, their techs, and the qaulity of the reapirs. Are they doing it correctly or doing it cheap and shoddy? There are helms body repair manuals that tell how the OEM recommends body damage, etc be fixed. Some qaulith shops follw the proper methods, other cheap shops, "chop shop" style shops, just "chop" it toghter to look good.

I really can't say how they repair things withut being there and knowing their work. I can say that around here, every shop seems to have the areas they cut corners, etc. I have seen some VERY dishonest big name shops, some pretty honest big name shops, so honest small shops and very crooked small shops. I have noticed more often than not, shops very listen to what you have to say until they screw the repair and yo make them fix it (at least around here). As for paint qaulity, what brand of paint do they use first off. Secondly, a qaulity paint job is ALL in the prep work. If they prep the new parts and areas to blend properly, it should turn out ok if qaulity products are used, if they are mixed properly, etc. If they just hack it and spray it, even a qaulity paint product won't look too good. Dupont, PPG, and House of Kolar (A Valspar refinishing company I believe, but they are mostly custom paint) are all good paint companies. Is your paint OEM or is it an custom paint job you had done? If it's an aftermarket paint job, you may wish to keep all the paint on the car the same brand. Generally a good color match and a good blend means you can't tell, even if the car was Dupont before and the repaired/blended part is done in PPG. However, some people (like myself) perfer to keep all the paint on the car the same type (especially if they have a different paint job than the car came with). For them, it's important to make sure they find a good shop that can and will use that type of paint.

Sorry I can't really be of any more help.

[TechX]

If vehicle has been involved in a medium to severe crash it will NEVER be the same. It will only be close and there is a much higher chance that it will develope problems in the future.

[solaris=amazing]

echoman pdx, thanks for all that info. The shop uses ppg btw. And yeah i hope they don't cut corners man. TechX, the accident wasn't to bad on my part, these 95 birds are tanks, 5 star crash ratings on front and side. Weighs in at like 3700lbs, vs. the 04 neon which is pretty much plastic and i believe like 3000lbs. The impact mainly hit the top of my wheel (front drivers) and the fender/panel. My wheel is bent at an angle, not to to bent though. Man i can't wait to get word on all of this-i'll let yall know what happens.

[SaabJohan]

You have all missed the most important thing; how did the chassi handle the hit? Is it still straight or have it been deformed? Mechanical parts can simply be replaced and OEM style parts can often be produced by the same company that makes the OEM parts. When replacing mechanical part the car will become as it once was. The paint job can sometimes be a little different, but that isn't that strange since the OEM paint is done by a robot and the repainted area isn't. The old paint is also just that, old that is. That means that the sun, weather and so on has affected it. However, if the car is correctly painted, and after that the car is polished you shouldn't be able to see any difference. But the main point is if the chassi is ok.

[MagicRat]

Originally Posted by TechX

If vehicle has been involved in a medium to severe crash it will NEVER be the same. It will only be close and there is a much higher chance that it will develope problems in the future.

Nonsense.

As the other post points out, the quality of the work is paramount. Virtually anything can be repaired. If the shop is conscientious with skilled employees, things will be fixed just fine. Reputable shops are just that: they have a reputation for quality work to maintain, if they hope to get work in the future.

One final point, be sure the insurance adjuster allows for enough money to fix it right and not cheap out. Ask the shop if they got enough money. Don't be shy. Adjustors are there to negotiate an inflated repair bill, but not unfairly hammer the repair shop down to the bare bones.
If you feel the shop is skimping on repairs, complain to the adjuster.

[TechX]

^I am sorry. I still find it hard to believe you would argue that a car would be magically taken back in time by some fairy shop mechanic spell. Even with the best shops doing the work a violent crash can increase the chance for electrical connection problems (like my parents old jeep) and longterm alignment problems. Squeaks, rattles, and chances for future problems are greatly increased. If you understand unibody construction then you know a unibody vehicle can be tweaked from front to rear when involved in a wreck. You are right the best shops do a nice job but a wrecked vehicle is a wrecked vehicle period. It DOES increase the chances of problems in the future. If you don't agree good, you will be the guy who buys a prewreck and I will not.

[Moppie]

I currently drive a car I bought off a panel beater, it was one he bought off a customer who didn't want any more as it had been damamged.

He had to replace the entire right rear quarter, rear bumber and all the door locks.
He admitted to doing a cheap job on the door locks and bumber, even showed me what he had done, and sure enough the bumber dosnt quite fit right, and the door locks are a bit dodgy at times.
However, he did do a top notch job on the rear quarter panel damage, and given that the car is 15 years old its currently the straightest, smothest best looking section on the car.

Before purchasing it I drove a mid 70s Civic that had been diven a completly new front cut. It was literaly cut in half at the firewall and a new front end from another car was stiched on. The job was so well done you could not tell unless someone told you, or in my case you saw the car before it was repaired.


As said above by several people, both of them more expiarianced with cars and engineering than most people will ever be, if done correctly there is no reason why a repaired car should not be as good as it was, or even better than it was, before the damage occured.

[solaris=amazing]

Thanks alot everyone. I do feel this is a quality body shop. They have a good rep to-spoke to some people. I cannot wait to get my baby back, it's so frustrating that i had a complete tranny flush, new lebra bumper cover, subs/amp and all speakers installed-all this like a week before this sob hit me. I swear it there should be monthly test given by the DMV in order for ANYONE over 60 to drive-end of story. Hate me if you want to, but i still think old people and WOMAN should not drive, mainly woman though :-) People who don't value a car should not drive. I hate people that just basically "get in and drive", you know what i mean. The "oh this needs oil" kind of dumb tards.