truelove

a truck threw a rock at me today and put 3 pin-head sized chips in my paint above the back left wheel. any suggestions on what to do about it. touch up paint? what? anyone? can i get OEM touch up paint from mercedes through the dealership? thanks.

amdeutsch

Sorry to hear that.
Do you have an O'Reilly autoparts store in your area? Where I'm at they have a specialist paint matching shop within their store. It goes by the paint code on your car and only costs about 1/4 of what the dealer charges for touch up paint. The other option they do is to read the actually paint on your car, some special DuPont paint reader, and that costs only 1/2 of the dealer.
Just giving you some alternatives.
I did the paint code thing for hood stonechips and can't tell a difference in my paint match.

Rick

MB touch up paints from he dealer come with two containers...one in your color by code...and the other is a clear coat.
Ther clear cot is interesting in that it softens the color coat, blending it better than most touch-ups.

MarkL

I got the Capri blue touch-up kit from my dealer a while ago. (It's called "tansanitblau perl" on the bottle.) I used it to fix a couple of small chips on the lower door and it did a very good job. I used a toothpick (believe it or not!) because the area was much smaller than the brush from the bottle. The chip was so small I didn't do the "perfectionist" preparation, and it looks fine. It did cost about $25 though, but I figured it's the "real thing", etc... I just spotted a couple of small chips on my "A" pillar -- I knew I heard a stone fly up a while back which (luckily) missed my windshield, so that's where it must have hit.... Good luck!

Edit: Oh, btw, I just found the kit -- it says "5359 tansanitblau perl". The paint code in the brochure is 359 -- don't know what the "5" is... My kit contains 1-0.4 fl oz bottle of paint and 1-0.4 fl oz bottle of clear laquer.

pokerFACE

toothpicks work pretty well... but I still need to get the technique down

tifosiv122

Only problem is usually with touch ups...during certain light/angles you see everywhere you touched up...looks real bad...but its really the only option...do it before you get rust (if the scratch is deep)

Erik

truelove

anyone heard of this place. they have capri blue paint/clear coat touch-up kits. probably the same thing as the dealerships MarkL was talking about earlier. Capri blue is color code 359 on that site so you were right Mark. looks to be the real deal. price looks to be about $27 including shipping. i'll see what the dealerships have to offer and go from there. thanks guys.

https://www.paintscratch.com

p.s. what steps do i take to touch up the area. it's very very small. three little pin-head size places. what all will i need and what will i need to do. thanks.

Diz382Benz

my suggestion

Unless it's huge, let it be.

Is your car a show car, if it is then yeah cover that thing up.

But if it's just a daily driver, leave it, your going to get more anyway.

Just make sure you keep it clean and always have a coat of wax over it. Belive me when my car got it's first rock marks on my hood, I was pissed. Almost to the point where I wanted to get it repainted.

MarkL

Adam, if they're tiny like the couple I had, IMO, I would just apply a very small amount of paint to cover it up. Some people might say to sand, etc, but for something so small, I wouldn't want to enlarge the damaged area. If you just dab a "point" of paint on it, no one will ever notice. If you've waxed lately, you might want to clean that area to remove the wax so the paint sticks better. According to some on this board, the detergent "Dawn" in some water will do the trick of removing old wax. After the paint dries, apply some new wax on the area. Anyway, that's just my opinion.

MB-BOB

I agree with MarkL, don't make a small problem a bigger one with abrasives. You can accomplish a lot with those humble toothpicks (the cheap, flat ones). After shaking the touch up tube for several minutes, use the brush in the kit to put a healthy dollup of paint on some aluminum foil. Use one toothpick to stir the paint well to be sure the color is well mixed. Throw that TP away, then use a new one to pick up a small drop of paint and transfer to the pock-mark on the car. Make as many small trips back to the paint foil as necessary to just fill the crater, then stop. Let it dry overnight. Next day, examine your work. If a dimple remains in the repair, then repeat the procedure. If not, leave it alone.

The goal is to cover and protect the damaged area, not necessarily a perfect finish. Most of these stone chips are so small, only you will know they are there, and where the repairs have been made.

moomeh

i'm on my 23rd battle wound. it really sucks. the areas are mostly white or grayish. what does that mean? have i hit the metal yet?

truelove

thanks everyone. i wasn't planning on doing alot to it (like sanding and all that). the site i linked to earlier has touch-up pens which i may try. but it sounds like toothpicks are the way to go here so we'll see. i won't make it worse, i just wanna make it blue again instead of gray. and i'm more concerned with protecting the area rather than making it look perfect.

RedC230K

I use the pens from http://www.autovisuals.com and have been happy with the results.
Give that a shot!

truelove

paintscratch.com offers pens too. they're probably basically the same thing. thanks.

Pbglas

Red, how wide are the nibs on hte autosharp pens? Does the paint look like it is thinner than the dealer -- i.e., does it leave a mound or does it just color it? How long ot dry?

taylor192

The pens with some Langka work excellent to fill paint chips. Prep is required on light colour paint or else the 'ring' of the paint chip will be visible.

I also ordered the black trim touch-up pen for paint chips on the trim surrounding the windshield.

I have Brilliant Silver and 40+ paint chips (including a gash from debris off a truck). All have been fixed so they feel flat yet the colour won't match completely, the problem of the metalic paints, they never match 100% from all angles.

mctwin2kman

Lucky you, my first war wound was a week after I got the car, when driving to Upstate NY to show the 'rents' the new car! I got a tube of touch up from the dealer, looks ok, but mine was a 2.5 inch scratch!

CitronC230K_03

they are bound to happen!

btw, anyone know what happened to truelove. he hasnt been on in a long time!