So I had picked up an 18 C63S Cabrio a few months ago (June), and it looked like the entire front end had PPF on it. During the past week, I noticed 3 areas on the front bumper where there was peeling (pics below). The car definitely has PPF on the fenders, hood, door jams, door edges, and rear bumper. So my immediate guess was the front bumper had PPF on it originally, but during the CPO process, they resprayed the front bumper, and didn't bother to PPF it as well.

I took the car to two different high end body shops in the area, and they both told me the same thing: the clearcoat peeling is a symptom of someone not prepping the bumper correctly before respraying it. And that's why it's flaking off now. Bumper would have to be fully disassembled, sanded down to remove all of the clear on it, rock chips repaired, surface prepped, and then repainted. And of course, I need to wait 2 weeks before applying PPF. Oh, and the both told me the front bumper color doesn't match the rest of the car (it's designo Diamond White metallic, so it's not easy to match on the first try).

My issue is, I know CPOs often have work on them to bring them up to spec. The clearcoat definitely shouldn't be flaking off in 2 years on a low mileage vehicle (purchased with 9500 miles). The vehicle is under factory warranty, but I'm sure Mercedes warranty won't cover bad paint if it didn't come from the factory. But, if I can get the records of what they did to CPO the vehicle, and it shows the front bumper was resprayed, and it's obviously a subpar job, you think Mercedes would cover it? Anyone have a similar issue occur?

I know 2 of the 3 spots (the smaller ones) have a rock chip in them; hard to tell which came first (rock chip leading to clearcoat peeling, or clearcoat peeling exposing the paint to the rock chip). But the large spot does not have any rock chips in it. I'm afraid they'll tell me no, this is simply caused by road hazard, which is clearly not how that happens...

TIA!

 

WTF....that looks horrible. Not just clear coat flacking off like a peeling onion but all those chips. Cant help with how to get the dealer pay for it but does not hurt to try. I assume, like many dealers, they have a mobile painting tent guy in the back to fix cars in service, CPO's etc. That what my dealer has and the guys is great...for fixing little rock chips but not for painting entire panels (he actually refuses to do that), which can't be properly done in tent shop (dust control among one issue).

 

If it's CPO I would take it back to the dealer and have them fix it under warranty.

 

Car's been damaged and repaired. REMEMBER this: the stealership can repair a wrecked car and STILL CPO it. Good luck, guy. You're gonna need it.

How do I know this? It happened to me with another high-end brand.

 

In case anyone is interested, I contacted the selling dealership (in Cali; I'm in FL), and they requested 3 competing quotes, and approved the bumper to be stripped prepped, and repainted on their dime, based on the lowest quote I got. Had it done a few months ago. So that's pretty stand-up of them.