Help! Prius door ding... :(

I suggest a body shop. If you use the touch-up paint, you will see the repair forever.

 

Sorry to say it happens sooner or later. I left the ding alone. Some of the larger scratches I've tried to cover with the touch up paint but you'll still seem them (at some angles).

 

I'd seek professional help on this one -- no mini applicator for this one. Try the Toyota body shop or look for a dent specialty shop. We have one local that fixes door dings and dents for $49. Most of the dealers around here use them to "fix the dings" in their used cars. I've used their service twice and have been very happy. Check the phone book under body shop.

 

I've used Dent Doctor and been very satisfied. Someone punched or kicked a big dent in my hood. I was sure that I'd be ordering a new hood. The Dent Doctor guy spent about an hour on it and did an incredible job. Not a trace of the damage remains. Good luck.

Mike

 

Darn it, I feel for you!

Where's the location of the dent?

Maybe you can use the Prius Door Moldings (should have bought it sooner) to mask out the current ding and protect against the potential next one.

 

Sorry to hear about that - it would just kill me if someone did that to my new car. Sometimes a good auto body guy can "spoon" it out from the back of your door without any paint or fill in work. I'd check with a few different places just to make sure the price is right.

If you still have your temporary tags, you may want to leave it alone for a while until you get your real ones. Low life scum sucking pigs seem to target new cars. I had all kinds of problems with people tailgating me, not letting me change lanes, etc. until I got my real plates, then no problem after that. I was living in fear every time I left my car in parking lots.

Moldings are really more for looks than anything - but they really do look nice. They cannot possibly cover every permutation of car door that's going to swing at your car.

 

Same here, some inconsiderate posterior orifice dinged the rear rightside door on my '07 Seaside Pearl. Paint chipped all the way down to where grey is visible (not sure if it was primer or metal). The blemish is about half an inch long.

It's not bad enough to justify repairing the ding and repainting the door. I bought one of those touchup pens from Toyota and covered it up so it doesn't get worse. If it gets dinged up any worse, I'll pay for the repair-and-repaint. The touch-up is definitely visible on my car, unfortunately.

 

Passenger door, up along the line along the window, less than a 1000 miles. Talk about PO. Put the moldings on and hope for the better.

So the touch up paint doesn't look right? What gives there?

 

Dry Ice

Works Wonders

The hardest part is the proper gloves to hold the a dry ice chuck as you rub over the dinged area. Makes dings & such pop out and the metal contracts.

 

Touch up results seem to vary depending on the color. Metal flake colors are hardest. Best way is to touch up and colorsand . Call a touch up and dent specialist in your area. The dealer should be able to give you the name of a reputable person..

 

I have heard of people doing it to hail spots.

Where would you get dry ice?

 

I have survived one month without a ding and I went as far as changing grocery stores because my regular one has too many loose shopping carts in the parking lot!! There's no way I'm parking the Prius there. I will only return to my regular store when I take my old car.

I work at a college and leave earlier than 5:00 so I am still figuring out which cars in the lot are good to park next to that stay later than me. I want to avoid parking next to student cars at all costs! So far, so good, but I know the day will come when that ding shows up. hwell:

In a few weeks, we drive to DC to visit my daughter at college & I just booked at a hotel where I can self-park my car!

This madness has to stop!!

 

Yellow pages. Industrial section. GoOgLe + your city name.

Dry ice is used in packaging of perishable goods in shipping, so every city has a dry ice maker. In my area, there's one that's right beside a few trucking companies and has a big sign saying DRY ICE on the building.

 

i'd skip the $49 Toyota paint... it costs too much for touchup paint. save your money and shop online.

 

Call a dent specialist (eg Dent Wizard), NOT a body shop! They will get the dent out making the touch-up barely noticeable. Drilling and banging it out and patching it up with bondo and then respraying is not always the solution (depending on the color, the paint may not match perfectly - especially on metallics).

And this will cost 1/4 of what a body shop would charge.

 

What everyone said, just about. Dent removal guy will do a good job and won't cost you as much as a body shop.

A little kid on a tricycle got our Prius. Metal handle bar, no rubber grip... touched the metal just behind the rear passenger wheel well, slightly above the bumper line. The result was a wavy one inch scratch and slight dent. ARRRG! We know how you feel!