Car mirrors and door moldings begin to look unsightly when they are crying out for a new paint job. But there’s not need to spend a week at the body shop, says Aaron Baird. He owns West Coast Reconditioning, a mobile automotive reconditioning company based in southern California, and talks here about how he can fix either problem at your convenience.
Car moldings can come in different colors. Sometimes they are the color of the car; sometimes they are a black trim color. The moldings are on the side of the car to protect it from other doors opening on the side of the car. But a lot of times they get scratched themselves, and car mirrors get scratched as well from people walking by or other incidents.
We fix them with the same process as a bumper. You tape it off, mask it off, and once you have done that you sand out the damage. Then you apply the primer, sand out the primer, and if it is a trim black color, you get the trim black paint, apply it and you are done. Or if it is the color of the car, you mix up the color code, repaint it and then reapply the third coat and then you are done.
Fixing Car Mirrors
With the mirrors, it’s the same thing, as it falls under the same category so the process is the same. We are talking here about the mirror cover, not the actual glass, but the thing that encases the mirror.
People often think they need to buy a new mirror, not realizing that it can be fixed. Usually what they do is just leave it, so they have a scratched-up mirror looking back at them, sometimes for years. They do not think it’s worth replacing or getting fixed as they think it’s too much of a hassle to go to the body shop.
In some cases, however, car owners will buy a huge tube of touch-up from the body shop. They will put a big huge blob on the casing of the mirror and try to fix it in that way themselves. Usually the end result is a botched job that looks unsightly. Why not leave it to a professional who can get the job done right the first time?
