Ok here's the story. This past march my girlfrind bought me nismo sides and rears for my birthday from our local nissan dealer. After asking around, I went with a body shop that some of my fellow 350z club of florida members recommended.

After having them painted the color match was spot on. I did notice that there were a few imperfections on the driver's side skirt. I wasn't really too concerned because you couldn't really tell unless you were looking for it.

Well last week, while washing my car, I noticed that the paint was peeling off that same side skirt in the same area I noticed those small imperfections. After removing the side skirt, I was upset to notice that most of the paint on the underside was coming off.

This past monday I took it up the the body shop to have them look at it and have them fix their mistake. They were really nice, appologized and said they'd probibly have it ready later that day. I called later that day to see if it was going to be ready and the manager told me that they had to remove all of the paint and it wasn't going to be ready until tues or wed. I had no problem with the time frame. I just wanted the job done right.

So today the manager called me. I was busy at work and he just left me a message. He said that unfortunitly the reason the paint was coming off was because that the factory primer was what was pealing off. And that they weren't going to warrenty the work. He then suggested that I call nissan to see if they would cover it.

So my question is shouldn't they have preped the parts themselves and/or been able to tell me that they weren't going to honor their traditional warrenty based on the "condition" of the part. Should nissan even consider paying to repaint a part that has been painted once and stripped down, all the while never seeing it after being painted. Wouldn't all they evidence have been stripped away?

Brian

 

yeah, a good shop would of prepped it again.

If you bought the sideskirts with paint already on them, they don't strip off the paint, they scuff it up so the new paint will stick better.

If you bought it in urathane, then probably didn't scuff it up, or put on urathane additives so it flakes off. I need to see pics in order to conclude on this.

Either way, if they painted it, they should warranty it. They saw it before they painted it. If they knew it was going to be a problem, they should of let you know and didn't do it.

 

I had factory, pre-primed skirts painted for my Audi. The bodyshop did not prime as they were pre-primed from the factory. The paint stuck like glue and looked incredible.
If you ask me, they didn't apply the paint properly/dry it correctly. The fact that you saw imperfections before peeling might indicate contamination under their application.
It's not a big job for them to make this right. It really isn't.

 

I never took any pistures of the peeling paint I'm not sure what they are made of. Some sort of plastic. They're authentic nismo sides. I did notice that the underside of the peeling paint chips were black not silver, if that makes any difference.

 

There was no paint on them.

He did mention that nissan body parts have an oilily property to them from the factory and they use some sort of chemical to remove that before painting them. That was his original excuse for the paint coming off.

Agreed...and thank you.

 

Well I called the body shop this morning to get an update on the situation. The shop manager told me he called the nissan dealership that I bought the parts from. He told me that "nissan's going to step up to the plate and pay for the repaint job."

I find this hard to believe. Is it normal for a body shop has this kind of relationship with a dealership. FYI the particular body shop used to be who the dealerhip delt with until another autoway dealer opened up that has a body shop "in house."

 

Its possible, if they order alot of parts from that dealership.. But again, kinda weird they didn't prep it again.

 

The Nismo sides do not come primered, so whomever told you that was lying. No way will any Nissan dealer pay to fix this issue. Something is shady with the shop that you're using. If they do any sort of regular body work and paint, there is nothing different about doing these. Prep is the same as any regular stock bumper. Bottom line is that the shop did a sh*tty prep job.

 

Oh my god I'm so pissed right now! Until now I've decided not to name the bodyshop that I've been dealing with. But I went to pick up the skirt from NU FINISH and it looks like s**t!

First off the paint on the edges was alredy starting to peal off again. Also you could see places where they just painted over the old chipped paint!

After showing this to the manager. He tells me "like I said this part is defective and it's not our fault." He then suggests that I go to *** and speak to Brian Liddle (sp?) and have them give me a new one.

I then took the part over to *** and showed it to Brian. He called nu finish and spoke to the guy I was dealing with. It was actually kind of funny listning to Brian talk to the guy. He straight up asked him "does your paint guy even know how to paint?" Brian got off the phone and told me he was going to go ahead and ORDER ME ANOTHER SKIRT. I couldn't believe it.

I asked him if he really believes the part to be defective. He said that he honestly thinks that nu finish just did a crapy job and wont own up to it. He also said that he almost wants to just send it to autoway chevrolet and have them see if they can repaint it. I told him that I would be willing to do whatever he wants.

So this is what Brian is going to do for me. He going to talk to the autoway bodyshop and see if they could strip the old paint and repaint it. If not he's just going to order me a new one and have it painted. All at no cost to me!

I cannot believe how much Brian is going out of his way to help me out with this situation. I will always make sure that I will never go to any other dealership for whatever I need. I suggest that anyone in the Tampa/Brandon area do the same.

 

Oh And Bye The Way. Nu Finish, You Can Kiss My ***.

 

Most companies use a silcone based mold release agent on polyurethane components. (Not sure about your particular part though) It leaves a residue that paint does not like. It needs to be stripped off before primer and paint.

Most shops would know this and have the proper solvent/chemical for this.