hmmm..did some one say Maaco?
 

Has anyone had there mustang painted at maaco, i need a paint job because mine is starting to s*** on me. What do u think? so they do good work. Where did u get ur car painted? How much did it cost?


-Raini

stay away, they do lousy work for a cheap price. If thats what your looking for, they may be for you, but you get what you pay for in bodywork.

Stay away, it'll look good for a while, then start losing it's luster, and you're right back where you are now.

I have differing opinions on this. I would stay away if I was going to pay for a paint job, but currently my Stang is at a Maaco. My unlce who installs windshelds is trading them out work, so they are painting my car free.

They have several levels of paint jobs. The better ones are much more expensive and actually may be good paint jobs ( I don't know this for sure). The cheap ones I would say are just for freshening up a car's look before selling.

I am still working out details as to what level of paint job my car will receive. Hopefully something better, but I am going into this kind of expecting the paint to last only a couple of years. That is fine though, as I will be out of school then and can start a complete rebuild of my car.

I will try to post pics after my car is finished.

anyone else had there car painted there? I heard both good and bad i am wondering if it depends on the maaco u take it to. There are like 4 by my house with in a 10 mile radius. I think i may just hang around by one and see how many satisified customers there are.

I had my old FJ40 Land Cruiser painted there. I got the cheapest paint job they had and that is exactly what I got in return. They had paint on my tires on the windshield wipers and on my bumpers which weren't supposed to be painted. After all that I think it was stilll worth the $200 I paid for it. My Land Cruiser looked like crap before and the paint really helped it out.

I would rather have a blind, retarded monkey paint my car with oil paints than to take it to maaco. Every person I know who has gotten their car painted there has had problems. With one of my friends has his car painted black, only to have popping and peeling start within a week!

Better NOT get maaco. (don't think it matters, but these were all in the seattle area).

-DoranW

If you do the body work, sanding and taping up yourself it would be fine. They do a half-***'d job doing both.

that is what i heard, it is the prepping that their bad at. I heard that they just rub ur car down with some paint removers. Then spray it i really want to see a car that has been painted by them and then see what it looks like 2years later

From personal experience our household has had 2 cars painted there. The 1st was a 83 Camaro, it was painted and a week later it had paint bubbles bigger than a half-dollar coin and they did go back and fix those.
The second was a 1988 Chevy 1/2 pickup. Around the fenderwells in the back were rusting so we paid to have them cut out and replaced and then painted the truck. A year later the rust was back through in the exact same spot. The truck had to be repainted about 2 years later and my father and I replaced the rear tirewells and painted it ourselves and its been 2+ years and not a bit of rust.

how is the quality?

quality of paint? bodywork? prep?

how is the quality?

You get what you pay for. If you want a $200 paint job at Maaco, that's what you're going to get. I had Maaco paint mine with their highest grade paint and prep work, and I really don't have a complaint. They painted the engine bay, door jambs, replaced the windshield, pulled dents, prepped my hood and what not.

From the other shop's that I gathered quotes from, Maaco easily had the best customer service.

Before
http://www.kveder.net/mustang/images...re-paint01.jpg



After
http://www.kveder.net/mustang/images...ls/mine-01.jpg

the quality of the paint

Radon-
how much did u pay total for that Paint job?

A old buddy of mine had his car painted at maaco and he got the most expen. paint packages and it had runs and over spray out the a@@ and he had to have a body shop wet sand and buff the car out and now the paint looks great but he had them do 3 coats of clear coat

Let me put it this way....Good quality primer costs around $50.00/quart, and good quality paint cost a lot more.

If you were to buy good quality paint and primer for your car yourself (just paint and primer, no other supplies) you could easily spend $400.00 just on the paint....now Maaco is going to paint your whole car for $300.00?

news flash..they are using extremely cheap low quality paint.

Man, I am worrying about my stang after hearing all these horror stories :(. Once again, they would not be my choice, but lets remember quality could vary greatly between Maaco dealerships. I know their cheap stuff is junk, as there is a very low amount of solids in the paint.

Hopefully I come out alright on the whole deal. I would hate to have my car come back looking worse than when I took it in.

so where did everyone else get there car painted? How much did it cost?

I THINK MAACO DOES A DECENT JOB ON THE PAINTING PART, BUT FOR THE PREPPING AND BODY WORK, I SUGGEST DOING THAT YOURSELF BEFORE YOU BRING IT IN THERE. USUALLY IF THERE IS ANY IMPERFECTIONS IN THE PAINT OR BODY WORK THEY ARE PRETTY GOOD ABOUT FIXING IT.

As other people have said, you get what you pay for. Maacos are independently owned franchises, so it also depends on the owner, his work ethic, and how many beers the people working there had the night before. Maaco painted my car, but I also bought Du-Pont Chroma One single stage paint and made them use that, and I also did alot of the body work myself. It came out good nd three years later it still looks good. But again I take good care of it. Another thing to remember is that if you don't tell them to do something and get it in writing, then it probably won't get done.(for example if you don't tell them to fix the little ding on the hood, don't expect them to fix it) Good luck.

I had my car painted at Maaco, I couldn't justify paying $2,000 for a paintjob on a $2,000 car.

I did all of the prep work myself, removed the Taillight assembly, and let them take their time. When they say "when would you like it back?" Don't say Tomorrow. If they have time, they take their time.

I got the middle service, (Ambassador?) With the better paint, clearcoat, rock guard on the lower panels of the door, quarter, and fender, along with the sand and seal for $ 600.00 OTD.

Now, for $600.00, my car looks damn good, and all I have to do if I wanted, is wetsand it and polish.

If your paint is fading, and the luster is gone, you probably didn't get the clearcoat, and you should have.

1. Do the careful prepwork yourself, (that saves a ton of money)
2. Remove the lighting assemblies
3. Fix any small rust sopts and prime before going in
4. Let them take their time
5. Park your car for a week or so after it's done to let the paint
cure
6. Spend the $1,500 you've saved on mods... ;-)

Good luck.

you have any pic w/the paint job done, ugly?

Details?
 

If you are a "details" kind of person, I would stay away. Minor overspray, poor masking, and poor prep are things you might be looking at at those "volume" paint shops. Have them show you a random specimen of their work.
Get their best estimate and take it too a custom shop and have them show you their finished product.
Either way, let them know how serious you are about a quality job.
Good luck.
My paint job cost 2k, with several hours of body work and a luggage rack delete. Bare metal sand-down, 3 coats of factory scarlet red and I still find little things that piss me off.

Every Maaco is privately owned and operated, so to say they are all shitty would be like saying customer service at all McDonalds is shitty.

My dad gets his car painted by his buddy that works at Maaco, and my dad gets the best paint job, and his buddy preps the car, and preps it right. After 5 years, my dads 78 El Camino still shines like new with the Viper Blue w/ pearl metallic.

Keep in mind, a good paint job will only last with good care.

My car's paint is still in just about perfect condition (I am insanely meticulous....)

If I did need a paint job, body shop all the way. If I didn't want to spend the money on the body shop, I would just leave it and not get Maaco. Unless you just want to go from metal to any other color and you don't care about anything else.... Just my $.02.

Thanks,
DoranW

I have been meaning to say something about that. Their customer service does suck :)...j/k...sorta.

I thought they did a good job
 

I got my car painted at maaco in january and I'm very please with the results. I bought the car in august with a pretty danged up passenger door and right front quarter panel, after replacing both of them i took the car to maaco. I didn't get any of the door jams done or under the hood, but the outside of hte car looks great. After almost 6 months I've only found 1 chip in the paint and its right behind the left rear tire, it kinda looks like i kicked up a stone spinning my tires one day and took a piece of paint off. I got their "special", it was during there half price sale so appearently for 273 dollars i got there 500 dollar paint job, but i doubt it. I'll try to get some pictures tomorow and put em up for ya.

do some of you assume if you pay anywhere between $400-$700 for a paint job, its going to be quality? yes and no. you are taking a chance unless you know the guy personally. oh is any of anyones paint jobs done in base clear? if not your wasting your money in my opinion.

I had my car painted there. They did a great job for me. I am very happy. I paid like 480.00, and I did all the prepwork myself. I drove it in mostly maked as well.

Here are 2 pics.

hey EXGMGUY what color is that on your car, i have a 67 fastback that i am getting painted in about 3weeks and i really like that color. by the way your car looks really good

Oops, here is the 2nd one....

Thanks,
It is a Ford color. Light titanium metallic.

Hey raini, doesn't matter what you get. your car is still gonna be the biggest p.o.s. on the planet!:p ...I still get that H-pipe of yours...right...?:D ...j/p.

-Suave

Macco
 

Have had a couple of cars done by Macco over the years. First, you need to prep the car yourself. Wet-sanding and primeing and detail it down to no flaws.
Pre-tape everything accept what you need to leave open to drive it there. Remove all the chrome and trim that you can.
Wipe everything down with wax remover prep befor you do anything.
If you have rust, you need to use a Dietsler or Pittsburg or Dupont rust system on it, and epoxie prime over those areas yourself...befor you take it to Macco...no aerosals.
The rest is up to the painter there. They are all just working guys like us, and if they see you prep a car really well, they'll do a better job.
The actuall process for a really good job is, spray, wetsand, spray, wetsand, and then clear coat if you're useing a clear coat process....
Macco doesn't spend time on that.
In Detroit, a good clear coat paint job, you prep, is $3,000, at a collision shop.
They look alot better in really light, brite colors.
Go into a Macco and talk to the painters, alot of them work at home on the side also....and if possible, don't change color from the origional. And if you can find out who's painting your car, a folded $100 bill in his palm on the sly,will go along way....befor he works on it.

I paid $4000 CDN, approx $2600 US.

I had them do all necessary body work, rust, dents, prep.

That price includes painting the engine bay, door-jambs, and trunk.

I also had them install a new windshield, and I had them repaint all the trim flat black.

The paint is their high-end clear-coat option, and the color is Ford Performance Red.

They spent time prepping the Cervini Cobra R hood, as well as adjusting the hood, fenders, and bumper for better panel alignment.

Naturally, I do find small imperfections in the paint, but nothing anyone would notice if they didn't own the car and build it up in a garage for three months.

I would love to keep the same color but i feel it would cost way to much and it would never be the same, besides i feel the need for a change to black or fire engine red.
thanks again
pics attached


http://forums.mustangworks.com/attac...?postid=164552

I had my first Mustang painted there and it came back with runs in it , However I Just had it painted so I could sell it. So the paint job was a cheep one but the car still looked 100 times better. I did see some real nice cars being painted, It all depends on how much you wanna spend, My buddy is a good body guy and its about 3000 for a show quality paint job NO body work included.

My father and I paint cars as a hobby. I know how much time and money go into painting a car. I asked my dad about how good Macco was and he warned me. Well about a year later we added a 1988 Jeep Wrangler to our collection. The guy we bought it from had it painted there. They did not paint the inside so the outside was bright yellow and the inside was red. It looked like the Mc Donalds mobile. I went mudding for the first time and when I went to wash off the mudd alot of the paint washed off with it using a normal garden hose. We sanded it down and repainted it inside and out and it is a hundred time better. Macco left overspray on everything.

Thats a very good point... No matter what kinda job you get done from maaco, you will have overspray on just about everything. I left my car there for about 5 days, i thought that was plenty of time, and the paintjob is good, but there are a few spots where the tape job screwed everything up. I would do it again though. The car looks a million times better, and for under 300 bucks, well i couldn't do it that cheap myself.

exgmguy

I said it awhile ago and I'll say it again,you have one nice ride bro!

You just made my wallpaper AGAIN :D :D

Thanks again....:D

Your car is sweet man, but theres one thing I noticed that I have to tell you. Lower that thing!! It looks like a 4X4 truck with that ride height!

I agree, its pretty ignorant to label each Maaco as "poor", especially since they are FRANCHISES and NOT a corparation :rolleyes:

Best (and really the only appropiate advice) is to check out the one you are planning to take it to. Try to find some former (and hopefully pleased!) customers, and see what they have to say. I mean, I could tell you all day about buddy #1 got a great job done, and how buddy #2 had a lousy experience, but that won't help you in the slightest.

Good luck!