I'm trying to take care of my new Prius better than any other car I've ever owned ('cause I love the thing). No dings yet (yes, I'm parking in the far corners of the lot ) but I do have some paint chips (small ones) from highway driving. I've been googling around looking for a really good repair system for paint chips. Have any of you found something that works well? Anybody try Dr. Colorchip (http://www.drcolorchip.com)? They claim their system avoids "blobbing" that you get with brushes and pens. I don't mind spending more to get the best results, but it does need to be a product usable by "mere mortals." Thanks in advance, Steve
<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(lee @ Oct 3 2006, 10:48 AM) [snapback]327261[/snapback]</div> That's one I hadn't heard of, thanks! Any others? Thank you, Steve
Buy the little toyota bottle of your color. Preclean the pits with paint thinner. When dry, use a toothpick (not the included brush) to let the paint flow into the pits. Pretty tedious job when there are >50 pits. My 2001 hood looks like it has body-color zits when you look closely enough, because I was not always so very careful about filling them in correctly. But it can be done. None of the paint applied that way has spalled off in about 4 years. No experience w/other products.
<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(tochatihu @ Oct 3 2006, 05:33 PM) [snapback]327516[/snapback]</div> Seems like what the Langka and Mr. ColorChip products both include is some sort of "smoother" solvent that gently smoothes out the "zit" or "blob" so it's indistinguishable from the surrounding surface. Take care, Steve
Up here, we have a Toyota Touch-Up Pen. It comes with the colour on one side and the clearcoat on the other side and costs Cdn$10++.
<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Tideland Prius @ Oct 3 2006, 09:14 PM) [snapback]327614[/snapback]</div> Have you used it? How well does it work? Thank you, Steve
The pen is convenient for medium sized touch-ups, but unfortunately, is less than useless for pinholes and hairline scratches.. The pen nib is fibre and only narrows to about 1/16" at the tip.. I bought my Prius second hand, and the original owner did not have use a bra on the hood and it was pitted with literally millions of tiny pinhead stone/dust chips which are virtually impossible to retouch manually unless you have a lot of spare time and infinite patience.. The only use of the pen was to touch up a couple of the larger chips; with that large nib, it was useless for anything smaller.. The Langka system seems interesting, but I think I'd need a gallon size so that I could just blanket the whole lower portion of the hood with paint and rub down, otherwise it would not be any more efficient than manually dabbing paint in each of the individual pits.. For now, I've just covered the hood up with a bra, and no more new chips..
<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(c4 @ Oct 4 2006, 10:56 AM) [snapback]327779[/snapback]</div> Well, I'm going to a dealership today to pick up the touch up pen for Seaside Pearl. I have one large chip on the rear edge of the rear passenger-side door. You can't really see it with the door closed unless you're looking for it, and the primer's still intact, so I'm going to use the pen just to seal and protect it. And I'm going to order the Langka system today to try on my two or three tiny hood chips. I'll report back on the system here when I've had a chance to use it. Take care, Steve
I picked up a kit from www. paintscratch.com for my 06 silver. They say it is OEM paint and the kit comes with a paint pen, a clearcoat pen, a small bottle of rubbing compound and a small bottle of paint thinner. Included in the box was a card that has the car color on one side. The other side has instructions to test the color on the card to make sure the paint is an exact match. If not, send the card back to them so they can check and verify the oem paint formula. I haven't used it yet, but it seems that it should work. They also have a 12oz paint cans and large quanities (up to 1 gallon) available.
