what would be a fair price for a respray on my elan + 2.

[ubermass]

what would be a fair price for aquality respray on my elan + 2

[elansprint71]

what would be a fair price for aquality respray on my elan + 2

depends

[72elan1304]

I've been quoted between 1200 and 1800 pounds for a full respray in lagoon blue. This includes repairs to at least 3 panels.

That quote is from a local one man band. I've seen his work on other fibreglass glass cars and it's impressive. BUT, it's all down to cost. I believe the full strip back and respray from a specialist (Option 1?) is about 7 or 8k.

For my car, I could never justify that kind of cost.

[ricarbo]

i've heard it's 100+ man hours to rub it down, then there's damage revealed by old repairs which need rectification, so you can't expect it to be cheap, if it want it right at the end. Can't use chemical stripper on fibreglass, nor grinding discs, so it has to be done by hand. Why not ask a pro for a quote, e.g. Miles Wilkins at Fibreglass Services? Or do the preparation yourself, if you can face it.
Richard

[bcmc33]

what would be a fair price for aquality respray on my elan + 2

Are we supposed to guess where you live?

In the UK a proper job will cost about ?7k.

[pauljones]

Ubermass,

You have a PM.

Paul

[rocket]

I had my old glass car painted 20 odd years ago for 300quid,looked good and lasted well,also a chap i know through work had a reliant scimitar painted recently,it looks superb,?800.Not looking to have my plus 2 done anytime soon but i often wonder where the ?6ooo plus prices originated.Seems crazy to spend that much on cars that can be valued hardly any higher in total.I am not questioning the quality of option1 etc but i do wonder if the perceived difficulties in painting our cars are somewhat overstated?


Ian.

[stugilmour]

...I am not questioning the quality of option1 etc but i do wonder if the perceived difficulties in painting our cars are somewhat overstated?


Ian.

Ian, I think part of the confusion with this topic every time it is discussed is there is a wide range in the work scope undertaken for the stated cost range. Does your job cost range of ?200 to ?800 only include the paint and labor to shoot the prepared car, perhaps the masking? Is the priming included, or just a colour coat?

My car (when purchased) had what was presumably a simple re-spray with some filling of cosmetic blemishes. The job started to crack on the roof almost immediately. When I took the car to a pressure wash, a 4" chunk of paint came right off the car.

After removing the body (because of frame corrosion and damage), I sent it to a local fibreglass specialist (think Corvette) for prep and painting. The shop would only consider doing the job on a by the hour basis as we had no idea of the underlying issues. They took over a year to complete the work, using it to infill their schedule at a good shop rate, which he did not increase over the course of the work (even though his rate did increase). Even though he cut me a bit of a deal on the total billable hours, I seem to recall we ended up well over 150 hours for stripping, repair, preparation, numerous coats of high build primer & re-blocking of the body, and final painting. "Repair" scope included pre-fitting bumpers, fitting a sun roof, alignment of various panels, considerable time making the engine bay 'better than stock' to take body colour rather than the stock matte black finish, undercoating, etc. I could add up the hours from the bills, but I would loose plausible deny-ability with my wife. Obviously a lot of the stuff I got done is not required, Heck, none of the body work was strictly speaking required, but I would never tell SWMBO. Anyway, I would think work scope in my case is toward the high end of a range.

I am really happy with the work. No cracking except at known stress points like the door handle mount , light pod hole, etc, and the usual self induced zingers.

http://www.halerconcepts.com/1971_lotus ... ts_ltd.htm

On top of the body shop bills, I did considerable work scope myself including

• Stripping the car completely but leaving doors in place (body shop removed and re-installed)
• Removing the body from the frame (not necessarily required for simple re-paint)
• Checking integrity of the rocker side rails (already replaced in my case, but often need doing)
• Transporting the body to the shop (not a trivial exercise if paying by the hour)
• Numerous discussions with the guys doing the work
• Transporting the painted body back home (even more involved using an enclosed trailer)
• Re-installing the body on the new prepped frame
• Glass and headliner
• Re-assembly of the car, including re-wiring, making sure everything works, etc.
• Removal of lots of white overspray on various components (left over from the 'shoot & go' job)
• Storage of all the stuff removed from the car while the body work was being done
• Purchase of numerous 'body' parts, fasteners, carpeting, etc. required during re-assembly
• Fiddling with things like the window lifts, light pod lifts, panel alignment, etc.
• Lots of additional fiddling with panel & door alignment, sunroof operation, etc. some of which still needs further attention

ubermass, welcome to the forum. You can add your location in your profile, which helps a lot when folks are formulating answers for you. The forum is world wide, so answers should be expected to vary considerably. Even just your country is sufficient. Are you asking about a simple re-spray of a driving car that's prepped to a standard you are comfortable with; i.e. a 'shoot and go' deal? If so, it could be done pretty cheaply but may not last. The list above will hopefully help in figuring out some of the other stuff that may be required. Without knowing how much work is required, any answer will be sort of like 'how long is a ball of string?'.

HTH

[theelanman]

when I had mine done I had the choice of going the ?8k route however when talking to the garage they couldnt guarantee that it would last any longer than that of a ?1500 paint job.....
I also reckoned that even if you had the ?1500 every 3 years you'd get nearly 18 years out of you ?8k......well it felt like some form of logic.....
I think I just talked myself into the cheaper option.......which was very good indeed and is still on the car after 10 years......with virtually no marks at all....

[ubermass]

Thanks for the info i have a lot of bubbling in places but no spiderwebs.i had no idea of the cost for option 1. the most i could spend would be ?1500-2000.the colour is gun metal silver (grey on reg doc) just the best colour i've seen for an elan. Its not from PM.

[stugilmour]

ubermass, were you thinking dropping the complete car off or doing some of the stripping of components and surface prep yourself? I am not expert regarding prep, priming & repair required with the blistering issue, but there are several threads discussing the issue and possible re-occurrence if not prepped fully. Quite a bit of debate on how to go about it. From the UK responses so far looks like you can do the job within your budget if you are doing a good deal of the work yourself. Good luck with the job. Post some pic's.

[ubermass]

stu i heard that the problem with bubbling was caused by moisture in the bodywork prior to painting , the problem with doing the prep work myself is that i don't have a garage i would hate to make matters worse .Will need to get some advice about this before starting .i will post some pics .

[Spyder fan]

I went the budget route with my +2, I sprayed it myself 6 years ago and got a good finish. Then some kind person drove their Ford Focus into the back of it, so I got another respray on an insurance claim, this was applied on top of the existing paint apart from the damaged parts of course. Overall it looks quite presentable and has a very deep shine, it looks like a 4 or 5 year old very well cared for car, a few chips here and there and a few cracks and blisters, but most people would be very pleased with it.

Flatting off the existing paint then sealing it off with highbuild primer taking care to blend out the microblisters will result in a presentable finish for the colour coat and you avoid introducing more moisture into the bodywork. You need some quotes to go down this route and maybe get to see some examples preferably those that have aged a bit so that you can see if they stand the test of time, perhaps ?2000 is a good ballpark figure.

My S4 is a totally different thing regarding the paint, it was body off, paint off, repairs to anything that needed it, engine bay matt black and full stonechip to whole underside of the car, bumpers and wheels colour matched to the sidewinder stripes, the cost was ?7200. My cars are my 'Other Women' they may be expensive but are a lot cheaper than a divorce.

Regards

[ubermass]

Thanks for the info alan . I took the elan to work today for the first time as some of the guys were desperate to see it, a couple of them are engineers and one has just bought a westfield and is very experienced on rebuilds etc .The road is notorious for impatient drivers speedin towards kidderminster at 6.30 -7 am overtaking on blind bends and pushin in to evade oncoming traffic so u hav to brake is the norm (.Don't get me wrong i'm no prude and given a straightish bit with no obvious danger i like to push it.) Anyway after about 8 miles of travelling just above the 40 and 50 mph speedlimits i ended up with a car right up my arse weaving about and lookin to overtake all the time being a real prick, anyway as i was coming towards the long hillclimb and turn into work i just gunned it in 4th gear and into 5th half way up, the response from the 2ltr zetec & jenvy throttle body with emerald management was instant and devastating all he saw was a disappearing rear end with lotus written across it...you can call me childish but i loved it.

[innesw]

I had bubbling on my old paintwork before I had mine re-sprayed, this was not due to moisture below the paint (but that can happen) but was caused by excess solvent as the car had not had enough time between coats of paint, so the solvent instead of escaping slowy formed large 2-10 mm ish blisters over time. Most professional painters and repairs have infra-red ovens which they bake the paint on, slowly.

It also takes a bout a month for all of the solvent to 100% escape the paint work.

Removing the blistered paint on my car uncovered a massive bodged repair of the front end of the car...

Innes