Rocks thrashed my wifes hood

[dustind]

Just got back from Arizona for xmas and I washed our Sienna this weekend. It was covered in grime and dirt from driving in the snow. Well once cleaned I found that her hood had two large chips out of the paint and a bunch of small ones. Apparently the AZ DOT likes to use sand on the mountain roads which got kicked up on us. Good think my A3 was safe at home in the garage.

So with that said does anyone have some recommendations on how to protect the hood until I can get it repainted?

[Ricky8997]

3M clear bra

http://solutions.3m.com/wps/portal/3...gard-PPF/Home/

[mullardel34]

I've regularly used the "Dr. Color Chip" system to successfully repair rock-chips and road-rash on my cars. While no paint-repair system will restore the finish on your car to the full equivalent of a professionally-administered repaint, the "Dr. Color Chip" system does a great job of repairing the paint protection for your sheet-metal and masking/hiding the rock-chips.

The really unique aspect of this particular paint-repair system is the "no-blob" finish that is made possible via their two-part paint system. I've never needed more than 20-30 minutes. You just brush-on the specially-formulated paint, literally smearing it into the painted surface with a nitrile-gloved finger, then you wipe away any excess paint from the undamaged paint surface with the second part of the paint system. Thus, nothing is left outside of the rock-chips and the transition from the rock-chips to the painted surface is completely smooth.

This paint-repair system gives you up to two hours to "work" the paint, so you have plenty of time to tailor the profile of the repaired area. Additionally, since there are no blobs in the repair, you can re-apply the paint-repair system as many times as needed to fill/shape the rock-chip repair. The end-result is amazing; you really can't see the repairs in my A4's paint unless you go explicitly looking for the filled-in blemishes.

The company URL is:

http://drcolorchip.com/

You just send them the factory color-codes for your car (their Web site has diagrams that show where the color-code information is located on your car) and they custom-mix the paint to match (they're even willing to work with you to adjust the paint color to get a better match to your paint's current condition). Check-out some of their before/after photographs of repairs that they have posted on their Web site. There's certainly a learning-curve on applying this paint-repair system, but that's OK, since you have up to an hour or two to either complete the repair or remove the materials from the car finish. It's saved me numerous trips to the body-shop to address the cosmetic repairs of rock-chips and road-rash...

--------------------------------------
Mullard EL34
* 2003 A4 3.0L Quattro (6-speed manual)
* sport package
* 18"x8" Moda MD5
* Sumitomo HTR+ (235/40ZR18))

[A4 Dream]

I've regularly used the "Dr. Color Chip" system to successfully repair rock-chips and road-rash on my cars. While no paint-repair system will restore the finish on your car to the full equivalent of a professionally-administered repaint, the "Dr. Color Chip" system does a great job of repairing the paint protection for your sheet-metal and masking/hiding the rock-chips.

The really unique aspect of this particular paint-repair system is the "no-blob" finish that is made possible via their two-part paint system. I've never needed more than 20-30 minutes. You just brush-on the specially-formulated paint, literally smearing it into the painted surface with a nitrile-gloved finger, then you wipe away any excess paint from the undamaged paint surface with the second part of the paint system. Thus, nothing is left outside of the rock-chips and the transition from the rock-chips to the painted surface is completely smooth.

This paint-repair system gives you up to two hours to "work" the paint, so you have plenty of time to tailor the profile of the repaired area. Additionally, since there are no blobs in the repair, you can re-apply the paint-repair system as many times as needed to fill/shape the rock-chip repair. The end-result is amazing; you really can't see the repairs in my A4's paint unless you go explicitly looking for the filled-in blemishes.

The company URL is:

http://drcolorchip.com/

You just send them the factory color-codes for your car (their Web site has diagrams that show where the color-code information is located on your car) and they custom-mix the paint to match (they're even willing to work with you to adjust the paint color to get a better match to your paint's current condition). Check-out some of their before/after photographs of repairs that they have posted on their Web site. There's certainly a learning-curve on applying this paint-repair system, but that's OK, since you have up to an hour or two to either complete the repair or remove the materials from the car finish. It's saved me numerous trips to the body-shop to address the cosmetic repairs of rock-chips and road-rash...

--------------------------------------
Mullard EL34
* 2003 A4 3.0L Quattro (6-speed manual)
* sport package
* 18"x8" Moda MD5
* Sumitomo HTR+ (235/40ZR18))

wow man. thanks a lot... I was looking for a paint kit like this a while ago and pretty much gave up because they all seemed kind of shady.

[mullardel34]

You're quite welcome! Like yourself, I had also been in search of an alternative to running my car to the body shop every time my machine's finish got nailed by road crap (stones, sand, etc.). A friend in Colorado tipped me off to the virtues of the "Dr. Color Chip" system, so I gave the system a whirl, based on his recommendation. I had tried a lot of the other paint-repair systems and the best that I had previously found was the "Langka Blob Eliminator" (http://www.langka.com/the-blob-eliminator-p-31.html), which shares some similarities with the "Dr. Color Chip", but the "Blob Eliminator" doesn't integrate a matched, color-code-correct paint into the solution.

Just remember that there's a bit of a learning-curve with the product, so be sure to start out with less-visible paint-chips further down the body (or inside of the door jambs), then move on to tackling repairs of the more eye-catching paint-chips that have been inflicted higher on the vehicle body as your application skills develop. And save yourself some time and frustration; run down to the local pharmacy and pick-up a box of nitrile exam gloves for use in the paint manipulation phase of the product application (the "Dr. Color Chip" product only ships with one nitrile glove in the kit). The nitrile exam gloves do not react with most of the chemical compounds used in automotive paint systems.