04 Tundra Paint Job

Hi,

I have a 2004 Tundra that has been my primary driver since 2006. 253k miles and it is an awesome truck. I try to take good care of it.

I’ve recently been thinking about fixing some minor dents in the left rear and re-painting. The paint is pretty decent, but it’s spent a lot of time in the woods and has a lot of small scratches, etc. I got a quote at a shop near me that had great reviews and they wanted $2,600 for the rear dent fixes and paint for that section. Seemed somewhat reasonable. I then asked how much it was to paint the entire truck and I believe they said $11k (on top of the cost to repair the dents). This shop said they only do high quality work and that a lower quality paint job was not worth the time.

Thoughts? Thanks!

 

You spend that kinda money it's a GUARANTEE that somebody will back into it and ruin it. Save the money, get a good detail (or any other items that you'd enjoy on it), and enjoy the truck.

 

1st off I love the Gen 1's but a total paint job in today's world is way over the top! Yours look excellent the way it is! We now live in NorCal where all cars and trucks get rough treatment and have scratches and dents. Vehicles get washed up here every 6 months, in SoCal I washed my vehicles weekly. Not like where I grew up in SoCal where most cars looked great and not beat up. I sold my perfect Ford Raptor (miss that truck!) and bought a 2nd Gen Tundra pre-scratched and dented as I knew nice cars and trucks were a thing of the past living behind the "Redwood Curtain". Just my .02, it is a 21 year old truck and you will be married to it if you put 11K into paint, but it's your $$$$.

 

Send some more photos of the dents and scratches. I've repainted a lot of small spots on my truck, and unless you look close you'd never notice. I'd bet that you could make a lot of those scratches disappear at 10ft away.

That said, I agree with NoRcptn and Eddy20 above. It's a pickup truck- meant for doing work. It's going to get dents, scratches, scrapes, it's just in the nature of what it is. It'll never be perfect, so why try to make it perfect? My truck has a million rock chips, but that's just a sign of it's longevity.

 

Yeah, I appreciate the comments. I will send some pics when it’s daylight and I get a chance. I’m definitely not considering an $11k paint job. I was hoping it would somehow be like half that price, but I was obviously mistaken. I asked here because I wanted to see what y'all thought about that.

I bought a paint touch up pen/brush and have done some touch up work. It looks decent, but it’s definitely obvious if you get close and look.

I’m leaning more towards spending money putting Bilstein shocks on it to get it a little higher. Maybe shackles in the rear, but I need to do more research there.

The power steering is also slowly leaking and I was told the entire steering
rack needs to be replaced. I have been delaying that just because it’s quite expensive as well.

Thanks!

 

$11k paint job for an $11k truck?? Pass.

 

Well, after it is painted, it will be worth more though. Like $11,500 easy.

Seriously though, I agree with the others. It will get dinged again soon enough. I've a few door dings on my truck that I'd like to get removed. But I live and park in a major city. I'd get a brand spanking new door ding within a week.

If you were looking to spend 'like half' of 11k, that gives you room for a lot of quality mechanical/suspension upgrades. Those you can enjoy a lot more. You can't even see most of the paint while you're driving it.

 

I got quoted 6k for mine and they didn’t even want the business. They cared more about insurance jobs/claims

I’m happy to spend 2.5-3k maybe 4 to a shop that’s going to take my project serious

 

If you really want to spend some money and change the trucks color or freshen it up. Look into a wrap, its a lot less expensive than an 11K paint job.

I'd just drive it as is.

 

DIY...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vrTUs9ddS_A&ab_channel=ViceGripGarage

 

Have a good detail shop polish/ buff it up. You might be surprised how well the old paint still shows.

 

I repainted my 2004 and 2006 RCLB FGT's myself with single stage urethane. Fixed a few minor dents. Same color as original in both cases. Paint and supplies cost about $800 each. The green metallic one looks a bit amateurish with several runs but the solid white one came out nice. If I had to pay someone to do them, no way in hell.

 

Good thought, but I had someone do a detail clean and he also measured the clear coat last year. He said he would not recommend buffing it due to the clear coat being thin. I think he did use a clay bar (can’t recall for sure) and it looked good after.

It has been buffed years ago, so that must have contributed to a pretty thin clear coat.

 

That guy is such a tool bag, I couldn't stand to watch him anymore with all his dumb ass sayings like; sparkalator and fuelmakeithappener.

 

To each their own...point is you can find dozens of examples of DIY paint jobs if you look.

 

It's a Canadian thing.

(Yes, aND I MNkow, WIhat you'll say to that)

 

It's expensive to do it right.

For a shop to paint it like factory, they remove every item that touches the painted panels, strip the paint, repair dents/dings and respray with a 2 stage paint.

The cheaper the paint job, the cheaper you get. Some won't remove any parts and instead of they just tape them off. Some will only use one stage paint that won't last a long time and fades rapidly.



The quality depends on you. Do you want it like brand new? You'll spend a lot of money.

Want it just refreshed? You'll spend less money.

 

Just get it touched up and detailed, looks clean as it is.

 

Single stage urethane is the same stuff as your clearcoat, only it has pigment. If it fades you buff it out, same as clearcoat. I used single stage urethane on both of mine, many coats so it will buff out several times if I ever get that ambitious.
I agree with your point, cheap paint isn't a bargain, and when you hire the work done, it's always possible that the painter charges you for high end paint and uses economy paint that lasts 2 years. Very few paint shops will even entertain the idea of doing paint jobs for customers. They like to work for insurance companies.

 

We do customer pay jobs pretty frequently, but not full paint jobs. (Except for the ZKG paint warranty on the white Toyotas)

The reason being is time. It takes about a month to do a full strip, repair and repaint. Our shop is production based, so the more we get move through and get done, the more we make. Most shops operate this way and is why the perspective that shops won't do full paint jobs is out there (some also just don't want to deal with certain customer personalities). If the shop is slow enough then they'll probably be more inclined to do full paint jobs.

 

Insurance company personalities are more predictable.

 

Yeah, the shop was talking about how if you don’t strip all the way down to the metal you risk the primer failing under your nice new paint.

 

It's not a great risk. Unless a vehicle has been repainted unprofessionally in the past, or using linseed oil based paint, there is usually no reason to sand beyond any flaking clearcoat.

 

The number of vehicles I've owned where I started sanding into it, and before long it looked like a Jawbreaker, is too damn high.

With proper prep, you don't need to get down to metal. I'm sure there are probably some cases I am not aware of, but I've never had or seen issues. I know if there's clearcoat, you gotta take it down to the basecoat, but single-stage ... your paint is basically your primer!

 

Since the clearcoat is in fact just clear single stage urethane, you don't have to sand it all off. Only where there is delamination. Then use an epoxy primer seal coat over entire vehicle and shoot single stage urethane paint over it. The reason you need the epoxy primer is because the sanded surface is part clearcoat, part primer, part bondo and part basecoat.
I always use single stage urethane paint because it's the only paint I have experience with besides solvent based paint. Some say it's easier to paint base/clear because runs are less likely to be an issue.
Runs can be sanded and buffed out of clearcoat or solid color, but not with metallic single stage paints like I sprayed on my green RCLB.
My white RCLB had factory single stage paint so I only needed to spot prime areas that I bondoed or sanded through and then shot the paint on. Easy peasy.

 

Only saying, if the clearcoat is delaminating in one spot, it's indicative of an adhesion failure between clear and base. If it's happening in a broad area, or in multiple areas, chances it's ultimately going to delam everywhere. Best course of action is to sand to basecoat. But given how hard it can be to tell if you're fully into basecoat - you can't just by "milky dust vs. colored dust" because you'll start getting colored dust as soon as you cut into the basecoat anywhere - I totally get what that shop is saying (or maybe how @TheOak04 is interpreting what they're saying) about taking it down to bare metal.

Would be a bummer if you're the shop and you sprayed primer onto a clearcoat that was delaminating elsewhere, then throw paint on top of it, the old clear delaminates, and it trashed up a perfectly good paint job 2-3 years out.

Back in the day (1980s/90s, so not too far back) when 'bowling ball' (marble) paint jobs used to be a common go-to, I saw a lot of stupidity in the car scene, out of local shops in the SoCal and central FL scenes. I'm glad my truck is single stage. I'm very familiar with single stage, as I think you are too, it's awesome stuff and can look really damn good if you know how to cut and polish. But damn, a nicely done candy or marble/bowling ball paint job is something I find myself drawn to out in the wild.

 

I just remove all clearcoat a couple inches past the delamination interface, lightly sand the rest of the clearcoat and call it good. Most likely many of the shops charging us for complete removal of clearcoat are doing the same and not having comebacks. Sanding sides of a vehicle is much more work than the hood or roof, and sanding being the most labor intensive part of any paint job, it's not worth it for most of us to do it. It's been 3 years since I did that on the green truck and no adhesion problems whatsoever.

 

Yeah, your summary is basically what the shop said. We didn’t discuss the exact specifics too much, but that was the message. Thanks

 

At least they're being honest and up-front with you about it. Means they care about their work and reputation. That's the kinda shop you want to deal with, but unfortunately that usually comes with a higher price tag.

 

Lots of shops, both paint and mechanical will bid a job based on worst case scenario, then anything along the way that they figure isn't needed is more profit to them.
Same goes for the building trades. Contractors will bid a job based on certain specifications, then profit on what they deem is not needed later.
Old trick.
One time a concrete guy, after starting the job he agreed to do, told me something which was specified in our agreement wasn't needed and I ask what discount I would get doing it the way he suggested. He said none so I said lets do it as agreed.