have you ever been held hostage by a body shop

[drifter69]

So I take a complete car to them, minus rusted away sheet metal. And now the car is out of paint and I get a list of things they need to put the car back together ie fender bolts, shocks,mostly hardware that should have been able to be cleaned up and reused. I know that I will need to buy new stuff where needed but fender bolts. I think they lost things or mabee the 70 bee I saw in the shop is wearing some of my hardware? Am I just experiencing what everyone that takes a car to someone goes through or ?

[Khyron]

new parts are sometimes cheaper then the labor to clean old ones. If i knew then what I know now I would have bought mine instead of sand blast my old ones. Rust brings rust.

[UH60L]

I'v never been held hostage, but my wallet will never be the same and I'm still paying my investment fund back for the loan I had to use to pay part of the body shop bill.

Long story short, I do kick myself sometimes because if I had waited on the body work, I'd still be able to drive my car and would have had alot of money to use for things like....foood, clothes, new shoes, christmas presents for my kids, gas for all my vehicles, you know, little things.....

Now, I am temporarily back to living paycheck to paycheck until I get "caught up" again.

Body and paint bill $24,000.00.

Bank account $0.00

Debt $15,000.00

Credit card (used for engine build and other parts for body work) $14,779.00.

But, it sure looks nice....sitting in my garage.

[69 OUR/TEA]

I'v never been held hostage, but my wallet will never be the same and I'm still paying my investment fund back for the loan I had to use to pay part of the body shop bill.

Long story short, I do kick ymself sometimes because if I had waited on the body work, I'd still be able to drive my car and would have had alot of money to use for things like....foood, clothes, new shoes, christmas presents for my kids, gas for all my vehicles, you know, little things.....

Now, I am temporarily back to living paycheck to paycheck until I get "caught up" again.

Body and paint bill $24,000.00.

Bank account $0.00

Debt $15,000.00

Credit card (used for engine build and other parts for body work) $14,779.00.

But, it sure looks nice....sitting in my garage.

Where's the guy asking if $10K was alot?

[Cooter]

And all this time I've been restoring cars for $8000.00.....Body and paint..Most times they tend to add little things like Engine rebuild and swap to straight gear...And I have a hard time gettin' my money??? Hmmmmm, I MUST be doing something wrong....

[Khyron]

And all this time I've been rstoring cars for $8000.00.....Body and paint..Most times they tend to add little things like Engine rebuild and swap to straight gear...And I have a hard time gettin' my money??? Hmmmmm, I MUST be doing something wrong....

stop being so damn honest!

[stripedelete]

Oh ya!  I recieved a two year sentence.   Lost a perfect set of reverse lights in the process.

[HeavyFuel]

So I take a complete car to them, minus rusted away sheet metal. And now the car is out of paint and I get a list of things they need to put the car back together ie fender bolts, shocks,mostly hardware that should have been able to be cleaned up and reused. I know that I will need to buy new stuff where needed but fender bolts. I think they lost things or mabee the 70 bee I saw in the shop is wearing some of my hardware? Am I just experiencing what everyone that takes a car to someone goes through or ?

That's nickle/dime stuff....pay 'em, get your car back and be happy when it's back in your hands.




I dropped my car off at the shop in June of '06......and it's still there.

[Khyron]

and not to be an ass, I did most of the prep work myself, and yes, my friends own a body shop but made me do all the grunt work, they fixed up what i did wrong and taught me what i did wrong and how to do it the right way.

i bought the supplys, I disassembled and re assembled, My car was done in about 9 Months give or take.

Yes I have a wife and 2 kids

Yes I don't have a lot of money

Im not trying to come across as a jerk, but if you are unhappy, take the car back and do it.

I cut a few corners, and to this day it bugs the hell out of me, no one see's it, but I know it's there.

[The70RT]

A lot of fender bolts & clips that are 40 years don't make it as you removed them. Some will have to be cut or ground off. If you tried to clean all the bolts and fasteners like I did you will realize it takes a lot of time and patience and is tedious work. I went though two wire wheels on my grinder. That should be one of the cheaper things to replace during the resto. Yeah if you don't do it your self you will have to pay the piper.

[hemi-hampton]

 At $40-$70 a hour to pay a body shop to blast rusted parts & end up with pitted parts you could buy them new cheaper & non pitted. I've been paid twice as much many times to clean old rusted crusted pitted rusty parts because the car owner assumes it's cheaper. Even when you tell them it's not they still don't listen. LEON.

[UH60L]

At $40-$70 a hour to pay a body shop to blast rusted parts & end up with pitted parts you could buy them new cheaper & non pitted. I've been paid twice as much many times to clean old rusted crusted pitted rusty parts because the car owner assumes it's cheaper. Even when you tell them it's not they still don't listen. LEON.

That's absolutely true.  My car would have been even more expensive if I had not purchased alot of new pieces and had them delivered to the body shop.

My hood had what appeared to be butt dents.  Yes, I think someone tried to do a "Dukes of Hazzard" hood slide and messed up!  It also had two different dimples from the engine mount breaking and the carb stud hitting the hood (one was me, got on it a bit, hehe!).  The labor would have been more than the $600.00 I paid for a new hood.  Same with the quarters, trunk floor, right fender and doors.  Luckily for me, my car was not original and was never going to be again, thus, I could replace parts without feeling too bad about it.  At least it didn't go to the scrap heap, like so many of them in the '80s.

[PocketThunder]

I cut a few corners, and to this day it bugs the hell out of me, no one see's it, but I know it's there.

Doesnt that suck!  You spend years of your life going over a car and when its done nobody knows the little things like you do and they tell you how nice your car is but in the back of your mind you know right where that one little spot is that bugs you. 

[Old Moparz]

Agreed, refinishing or refurbishing parts can be a big surprise with how many hours it takes. An example I just went through was a pair of heavy duty leaf springs that were in great shape, just scale & surface rust. The rear for my car was fresh so I wanted to "clean up" the springs during reassembly. The springs with the shackles & hardware ran me about $275 when I bought them years ago.

I used a grinder with a wire wheel, then borrowed a friend's sandblaster to finish up faster. I now had to buy a line drier so my compressor wouldn't spray mud & water, additional fittings, couplings, blasting media, desiccant, paint, shackles, bolts, bushings, & what else there was. This doesn't include the hours of down time from gathering all this crap, as well as trouble shooting, researching & exchanging the wrong parts.

I stopped adding up what I spent at around $450 to refinish my $275 springs.  

And all this time I've been restoring cars for $8000.00.....Body and paint..Most times they tend to add little things like Engine rebuild and swap to straight gear...And I have a hard time gettin' my money??? Hmmmmm, I MUST be doing something wrong....

Some people shop for a high price thinking they will get better work. I've seen it with home improvements first hand & lost work because my price was too low.

[6pkrunner]

........ I've seen it with home improvements first hand & lost work because my price was too low.

Too true. We are ingrained to the old "You get what you pay for." adage. This can work against us. People automatically believe the more expensive something is, the better it has got to be. This allows rampant ripoffs.

[sixty8charger]

I'v never been held hostage, but my wallet will never be the same and I'm still paying my investment fund back for the loan I had to use to pay part of the body shop bill.

Long story short, I do kick ymself sometimes because if I had waited on the body work, I'd still be able to drive my car and would have had alot of money to use for things like....foood, clothes, new shoes, christmas presents for my kids, gas for all my vehicles, you know, little things.....

Now, I am temporarily back to living paycheck to paycheck until I get "caught up" again.

Body and paint bill $24,000.00.

Bank account $0.00

Debt $15,000.00

Credit card (used for engine build and other parts for body work) $14,779.00.

But, it sure looks nice....sitting in my garage.

Where's the guy asking if $10K was alot?

i'm seeing it... i'm seeing it

[Khyron]

!  You spend years of your life going over a car and when its done nobody knows the little things like you do and they tell you how nice your car is but in the back of your mind you know right where that one little spot is that bugs you. 

ohh yeah :-(

and there is... somewhere on my car, a small bug that got clear coated..... thank god it's under a stripe :-P

[WB General Lee]

I have restored many cars and have had lots of these problems. There are way to many loosers in that business sorry
I dont know where to start. I restored a Superbird and the guy told me three months. It ended up taking a year and a half. When I picked up the car it was like 10 degrees outside and he had the car sitting outside. I wanted to pull it into the garage but I was so fed up with him I wasnt going to leave it anyway. When I got home I looked underneath and the rockers had surface rust on them still

I restored a 1969 Road Runner Convertible and had to pull it from the mechanic shop because it had been freshly painted and they took a long time and left it outside everyday so it got wet so bad that it began to yellow. I live far away so I couldn't check on it often. There are more stories but you get my drift.

I now have a guy in Kent Ohio who restored a car for me and did it in 5 weeks and is an awesome guy. He did a great job and no hassle. Very hard to find so if anyone needs a good guy let me know. Be very careful and don't give money upfront or very little. There are lots of scammers out there especially in a bad economy. I will never do another resto unless it is a Daytona Charger.