Partial respray after metalwork?

[Ulf]

My car is in pretty good nick in terms of the paintwork, not concours and with the odd stone chip or small scratch, but certainly not justifying a full and expensive respray. The thing is that the only visible rust on the right wheel arch lip is getting worse to the point of bubbling through. I'm thinking about having the rusty part cut away and replaced with a repair panel which should be straight-forward. But then comes the question of painting... 
As the wing blends seamlessly into the other panels, is a partial respray of the repaired area feasible or do I need to have the whole rear end of the car repainted for a tolerable result?

Ulf

PS: A tolerable result could be a small transition between the new and original paint that would only be visible for the critical eye...

[Larry & Norma]

I guess this is where a good painter earns his money. It should be possible to match the paint and blend in
in with adjacent panels to compensate for fading etc.

[thelews]

If it's clearcoated (silver is), any good shop should be able to blend w/o much issue.

[Ulf]

The clearcoat is very nice and deep, so that sounds good :-)

[Ulf]

Just a little feedback - I finally came around to having the rust spots repaired and the wheel arch painted - it turned out beautifully, a complete match. However, the idiot painter didn't cover off the rest of the car, so now there is paint everywhere. They've obviously tried to polish it off with mixed results - the entire edge of the soft top is now smeared with polish, there is paint on the rubber seals etc.
They'll get the car back tomorrow morning and have it fixed by Friday or else....

 

[Bonnyboy]

I feel your pain....The body shop should have the right equipment and know how to fix their problem. 

My car was absolutely covered with overspray from various things that were painted in the vincinity during its prior life.  I have tried various waxes and polishing compounds and the household stuff is all fairly ineffective.  2000 microfine polishing compound works great but is a bit agressive for larger areas.  It takes out major rashes and smaller gouges and most scratches.   I found that fibreglass restorer and polish originally for my fibreglass travel trailer is doing wonders for the paint.  It seems agressive but I am doing the car by hand in just the worst sections and just getting the overspray and stains (bird droppings and treated lumber and cedar siding left stains) off and then lightly wiping off the compound followed by polishing with a soft cloth.  So far I don't think I killed the paint in any of the places I tried it and all the stains are off and the paint is sooo smoooth.. 

I burnt a paint job using an electric polisher several years ago so I am still gun-shy to try that on my car with its marginal paint.  A previous owner or car jockey put swirl marks all over my hood which I hope to polish out slightly by hand.

Once polishing areas, the colour seems to be coming brighter and brighter and pretty soon I hope not to be able to see the three different shades of white on the car when inside my garage under the flourescent lights.  Outside its impossible to see where they blended the colour. 

[Benz Dr.]

I find that your average body shop doesn't take the time to keep overspray off the car. It will go everywhere - even places you can't see. If you are willing to pay for having the whole car bagged off then you will get decent results.
My high end body man bags everything off as he paints. All of the car except the places he wants painted, then all of those places he just painted. Done correctly, there is no overspray on anything. The results are a much better looking car. I've spent months detailing engine bays and running gear only to have everything covered in what looks like fine dust. It kind of angered me.....
 
Not covering the rest of the car is kind of hard to believe, not that don't, but really, is it that hard to do?

[Ulf]

Thanks for your feedback regarding the polish - but he will get the car back this very afternoon to fix it, but I doubt he'll be able to polish everything off and might have to paint the whole rear end of the car...

But we'll see - I'll bring a whiteboard marker to mark all the areas that need attention, stay tuned (this could get interesting)!

Ulf

[Ulf]

Hello again - after much heated debate, the painter agreed to mend this and have my car ready end of week. We ended up hugging, discussing art, cars (Jaguar vs Mercedes) and he even gave me a lift back to Copenhagen. Keeping my fingers crossed on this :-)

Ulf