agreed with socks on the maaco thing, ive seen them do really good jobs, and really shitty jobs, too much of a chance to take. from my experience a shop would rather them do the body work and everything to it, alot of shops will do a shitty job on purpose and say it was because of your body work, any paint is good as long as it's applied right, ppg is excellent, along with the top of the line dupont, but from your post it seems like you're trying to save money, I had martin senour (napa paint), crossfire (the cheap version) on my car and it had a SUPER shine and never had any problems, only had like $350 into paint lol its not really the material, its how its applied and what its applied to, now more expensive paints might hold off on rock chips a little bit more but for the $, i'd go with cheaper paint if your on a tight budget... i'd recommend pirannah putty instead of bondo, it sands SUPER easy, tis more expensive but well worth it!.

 

I'd say it's probly more of the person holding the paint gun as opposed to the place you have your car painted.

 

it iss the person holding the gun that makes the most noticable difference, but alas there are diffs in the paint as well, but unless your going for super sex show shine that usually comes with the top of the line paint & clkears then just have a good layer of clear youll be good,

 

Fiberglass Resin > Bondo

 

^^ Fiberglass resin sucks to sand. You'll sit there all day with a manual tool sanding fiberglass. Bondo comes right off and you'll use alot less time and sandpaper. Fiberglass should be used to repair fiberglass and fiberglass, not to mention fiberglass.




With enough layers of clearcoat, rubbing compound can remove all eggshell.

 

Yes, but bondo can chip and break. Fiberglass, once sanded, isn't going anywhere. Most bondo jobs eventually become evident, unless it is a very minor fill job.

 

^^Not if you prep and mix it right. Once you put the primer and paint on it, it's held together quite firmly and will not chip easily. If you've ever played with some hardened bondo, you'd know that it does not chip easily. Heck, you can't even break properly hardened bondo easily. But it sands well and is much more forgiving then fiberglass.

The point of using bondo is that you can sand it to the point where it is completely flat with the metal without sanding the metal. If you use fiberglass you'll definately be sanding into the metal to get it flat.

 

Ok. So I should buy this pirannah putty stuff instead of bondo. PPG is the preferred paint. What is a good pla ce to buy this paint from, do they have a catalogue on the site as well?

 

if its just a key scratch i would use pirannah putty, it comes in a tube and it's like $40 i think, and i've never been able to find a ppg catalogue online but i've looked plenty

 

Everyone has good ideas here. Deffinatly no maaco!! ppg is good paint so is house of colors if you want more of a custom color.

Bondo is a good filler I prefer metal glaze because it will bond into the metal as long as the area is sanded and prepped right. But what it sounds like your doing is just filling in key scratches which you dont need bondo for, all you need is a good filler primer. I use marhide. What it is is a thicker primer designed to fill in sanding marks and slight scratches i think this will suit your needs more then bondoing up the car.

and yes fiberglass resin should not be used to fill scratches and dents.