2004 Prius: 300K+ miles. I know this is more of a mechanical forum, rather than body work. But perhaps I can get help pointed in the right direction?
There is a scratch on my front bumper to my car. It left a 1 gash about 4-6 inches long, and a ¼ inch wide, but also left tiny scratches on the corner of the car. Probably happened in a parking lot.
Took it in for an estimate, and they wanted $1200 bucks!!! Took it in for another, and I was shocked, same $1250 estimate. I was expecting a couple hundred bucks, but over a thousand for a scratch? They say they have to take off the bumper, which adds to the labor and such.
I'm wondering if there is a cheaper alternative than to do all this work? Or is this the price of fixing scratches these days? I mean I did get 300K+ miles out of it, at the same time, the body is in pretty good shape for being this old, and I hate to see this blemish.
depends on the scratch of course. Maybe you should post photos for questions involving cosmetics ....
I would take it to a good local body shop that may be willing to mix you up some custom paint for it. What color paint do you have? The ones that have flakes, or pearl can be harder.
If you can get that, you can touch it up well enough to where it looks pretty good, at least from 10 feet away or so.
I did that once when I had to do some work on a baby blue VW Beetle. That was the best touch up paint I have ever used, and was nearly perfect for the car.
