[MPKind]

I've been holding onto my angst for over a year now. I know I'm not the only one this has happened to, but I figured I could let others know to be very cautious when choosing a painter.

My restoration of a '65 Catalina Sport Sedan is near end after starting it in 2001...yeah, it's been that long. I was shopping around for a local painter, and a fellow Pontiac brother recommended one in a neighboring state since he also was having a car painted with the same painter. I trusted him and went for it. What happened next was not his fault, and I don't blame him for my own situation.

Well long story short, it's been over two years, the car is 6 hours away, and I have no idea when it'll get done or return. To make matters worse I paid the painter half down and the remainder as time went by. Yes, I eventually paid the full amount. There were other mitigating factors that delayed the project, but I'm not going to elaborate.

I figured if I paid, he'd motivate and finish the project since he had other cars to paint as well. My theory is that he uses one customer's cash to finance other peoples cars. This is probably common in the industry of small time painters that don't have enough cash flow.

Some of my friends tell me to go fetch the car and all the parts, and take the loss on the cash I paid. Others say sue the bastard, or put a lien on his business. I just want it back with paint on it. I don't care if it's perfectly assembled or not. I can have a local shop help with the fit and finish if I have to .

I mostly try to not think about it, but I'm not getting any younger. I was 32 when I started the restoration, I'm going to be 50 this summer, and I'd like to enjoy it if possible. On that note, I'm not sure I'll even enjoy the car since the last couple years have caused so much heart burn. I'll finish it, but be so disgusted with things, that I may sell it and try to forget about it. Sucks that you put years of sweat, blood and tears into a project only to have some dink ruin the entire journey when it's near the end.

Please take your time when choosing a painter, don't be cheap or let get too far from home, get everything in writing, and make sure you're not financing other people's cars with your money because the painter is usually broke.

[tom s]

WOW,have a friend whos car has been in hell for 3 years and thought that was bad.Get it out of there and move on!Life is just too short.Tom

[MPKind]

It's been there for 2 years 4 months to date.

[marxjunk]

just go get it...get a sheriff to go with you and take it..


before your parts start missing...

heard it a million times..same pattern always...trying to find a good bodyman is tuff...most are ind pendant, and move to the next best, high paying deal, that benefits them..been in the bodyshop business my whole life..i see this all the time...

[Stuart]

I've been there before myself. Seems like a lot of independent body/paint guys are very talented at their craft, but are terrible businessmen. Hope you can work it out with him.

[1965gp]

I would go get your parts before they disappear. Unfortunately this happens a lot.

[PurelyGTO68]

I have to agree with the others....go get the car before it's too late. We almost lost our car when the guy who owned the resto shop got injured and laid up in the hospital. He lost his lease and the landlord tossed everything out into the road. The body and chassis ended up across the street but all the other parts found their way to other repair shops in the area (hood, fenders, nose, ram air pans, doors etc....). I was lucky to recover as much as I did.

When you get it back, empower yourself to finish the car if possible. There are many ways to achieve your goals. Body work can be done at home. It's mostly labor so take your time and call over friends to check your work and offer suggestions from time to time. There are lots of good forums to post questions and get help. Worst case is that you have to redo some work here and there. At least it's getting worked on.

The painting is a little more tricky but that too can be worked out. There are portable booths for rent and possibly hired guns that will come to you. Just tossing out some options to help get your project moving forward again.

I sympathize with your situation and wish for a good resolution whatever that may be. I have trust issues so leaving my car with anyone else probably won't ever happen again. There is no way it should take that long to paint a car. I started my current project in March of 2017. Total frame off, new floors and one new quarter panel. Just work on it during the weekends. Last weekend I sprayed the polyester primer. Will spend the next several weekends block sanding and then a final coat is sealer primer. It's slow going, but it's going. Been in the body work phase since Sept. In my experience, body work is the most tedious and time consuming part of a project and there are no short cuts....only lessons to be learned.

Here are a few recent pics of my priject. This time I was able to set up the booth at work but I have done this at home with my previous projects and it works well. A bit more work at home but at least the car isn't at someone else's shop gathering dust.

Where there is a will...there is a way. I wish you best of luck on this.




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[dataway]

I'll be going to a friend to paint my car. Never go out of town. Never put it somewhere you can't check on it almost daily.
No, my friend will not put a show quality, best in the world paint job on it, but I know his work, I see him at NAPA every week where he has his real job. His own cars are very nice driver/local show quality work. Probably cost about $3000 plus paint, maybe three weeks to get it done.
Hopefully he stays alive long enough for me to get it ready.

Just saying, people pay so, so much for super duper paint jobs on their drivers, just find a local guy with a decent reputation for getting the job done in a workmanship manner and go with that instead of some guy you don't know, that is supposed to do "show" quality work.

[Txbobcat]

Bite the bullet and go get the car and if you have to take it to Maaco

[Greg Reid]

Originally Posted by dataway

I'll be going to a friend to paint my car. Never go out of town. Never put it somewhere you can't check on it almost daily.
No, my friend will not put a show quality, best in the world paint job on it, but I know his work, I see him at NAPA every week where he has his real job. His own cars are very nice driver/local show quality work. Probably cost about $3000 plus paint, maybe three weeks to get it done.
Hopefully he stays alive long enough for me to get it ready.

Just saying, people pay so, so much for super duper paint jobs on their drivers, just find a local guy with a decent reputation for getting the job done in a workmanship manner and go with that instead of some guy you don't know, that is supposed to do "show" quality work.

This is exactly what I did. Cost me about $4K including paint. Took him about 9 months but I knew going in that I would be behind some of his regular business hours customers. I checked on it weekly and he had no problem with me doing some of my own work whenever I wanted to. I did 90% of the body work in my driveway before I took it to him.
I don't have a show car, just a nice driver. Photo is right after we rolled it out of the shop...

[mgarblik]

This situation is VERY common. Couple of things that were not mentioned. Yes, you will almost certainly have to go get the car. Your goal at this point is to get the car and the parts safely home with nothing missing or damaged. If you go in with guns blazing and the Sheriff with you, it is unlikely you are going to get everything, complete and in good condition. It's a bad situation, you want to end as best as possible. Now, if the shop doesn't agree to give you the car and every part in a peaceful way, complete, then, law enforcement may need to be involved.
Once you have the car and all the parts out of there and safely home, you can assess the real damages and monetary losses. Then you can make a NON-EMOTIONAL decision of what you want to do. In Ohio, at least, if the monetary real damages are $1500.00 or less, you can take the shop to small claims court yourself. You will need written contracts, receipts and all related paperwork. If this was a promise and handshake deal, your done, end of story. Since the shop is out of state, this whole deal could be complicated and the shop may have protection from their state.
Most of us have had some horror story concerning body shops. They are the "artists" and hold most of the cards. The better work they do, the more weird their business practices are and the longer it takes. My worst experience time wise was a Pantera I had painted that had 29,000 miles on it and was in near perfect condition when it went in the body shop. Owner wanted a color change. I took the entire car apart and delivered it to the body shop. 4 years later it was finally painted. It was perfect though. 20 years later, it still looks new. I am so fed up with these body shop hostage situations, when I buy a collector car now, it has to have great body and paint. I don't care at all about mechanical conditon. Doesn't even have to run. Best of luck getting your car finished.

[MPKind]

Thank you to all my Pontiac brothers for the encouragement.

I'll be contacting the painter to **** or get off the pot, AND that I'll be making a trip to visit his shop within the coming weeks. At a minimum, I have to see what the status of the car is and gather any parts not attached to the car. If there's a commitment on his end to finish it within the following 4 weeks (which is very doable) I'll let him finish, do the bare minimum of what he promised, and deliver it back to me. If he's balks at the idea of wrapping it up, I leave and return with a trailer (that I have to borrow) and bring it home. I'll take the major hit on the money I lost and get on with life. From what I do know, there was a fair amount of work done on it, but I have no idea where they stopped.

Until I learn more, I can't elaborate on anything else.

[Greg Reid]

Any receipts for payment? I learned a long time ago that when you pay ahead of time for ANY kind of work, most won't give a crap when they get it done, if ever.

[Tempest]

I found a guy who owns a small body shop and was willing to rent out his paint booth to me for a weekend.

I purchased the paint, the paint gun, the respirator, the tape and all the equipment, and he let me use his booth to mask the car on Friday Night, Paint it on Saturday, then I wet sanded the clear coat on Sunday morning, and sprayed 2 more coats of clear on Sunday, and picked the car up on Monday morning.

Is the car perfect??? absolutely not, but it is presentable, and the experience was great, and I can't wait to paint another.

As others have said, get the car home, assess the work that needs to be done, and think about painting it yourself.

Good Luck, and keep us posted

[dhcarguy]

Originally Posted by MPKind

Thank you to all my Pontiac brothers for the encouragement.

I'll be contacting the painter to **** or get off the pot, AND that I'll be making a trip to visit his shop within the coming weeks. At a minimum, I have to see what the status of the car is and gather any parts not attached to the car. If there's a commitment on his end to finish it within the following 4 weeks (which is very doable) I'll let him finish, do the bare minimum of what he promised, and deliver it back to me. If he's balks at the idea of wrapping it up, I leave and return with a trailer (that I have to borrow) and bring it home. I'll take the major hit on the money I lost and get on with life. From what I do know, there was a fair amount of work done on it, but I have no idea where they stopped.

Until I learn more, I can't elaborate on anything else.

KEEP US POSTED

[David Jones]

How could this kind of thing happen?

[69hardtop]

I was in “Paint Jail” for exactly a year. I had quite a bit of metal work done - which they did quickly but it seemed like it sat around forever after the metal work was done; they kept pushing it around to a different corner of the shop and it became a great accumulator of body shop dust. I kept visiting every week and they finally found some open time to finish it. My project was a 5 year restoration, but one full year of that was in paint jail........

[Greg Reid]

d

Originally Posted by David Jones

How could this kind of thing happen?

When's your car's parole hearing Dave?

[MPKind]

I decided long ago that I wasn’t going to paint it myself or do the body work. I did do a fair amount of metal panel fabrication and welding but not all of it.

Not knowing what it’ll be like when I get it back I have to have options with how to wrap it up. I have the money to finish so that’s not an issue. But it was an issue when I hired this guy a couple years ago. I’ve come to terms with the series of bad decisions and learned from it.

If there’s one lesson to learn from this experience, it’s thats when you try to save a few bucks it increases the potential for problems to arise.

I could’ve used a local guy that had a solid reputation and was relatively good with his pace but I decided go with someone that was about 1/3 less. In the end that 1/3 will get spent to correct this mess.

[David Jones]

Originally Posted by Greg Reid

d

When's your car's parole hearing Dave?

He's buying paint next week. So he says...........

Dec 10 2016, accident.
Late Mar. 2017 dropped it off at the shop.
Will it see an anniversary there? My guess is yes.