After you have applied touch-up paint, wait at least 30 days before waxing or buffing the exterior of your vehicle. The paint may look as if it is set up after a few hours but it needs time to adequately adhere to the surface beneath. Have you ever driven behind a salt-spreader in winter and heard the miniature comets crashing into the front of your bumper and bonnet? Stone chips are more common in winter months and due to the cold wet conditions, a deep paint chip can rapidly progress to a more serious and costly problem as water and ice get into the chip and can affect the metal underneath. A full panel respray is much more expensive, running to a few hundred pounds. But, many specialists will offer you a SMART repair (Small to Medium Area Repair Technology). This is a modern type of repair, which involves repainting just the damaged area. This allows the repair to be kept localised to the damaged area, saving you time and money. Professionals will use colour-matching technology to mix the paint, to match your car which is even more accurate and less noticeable than matching a colour code. Sold in a selection of GM original paint colors, each one of these touch-up paint pens features 0.5 ounces of four-in-one paint. You’ll get the color-matched paint that’s blended with protective sealant so you don’t have to perform multiple steps to get a perfect, protected finish. The pen also offers a piston-style pen tip that works for small chips and slim scratches alongside a brush applicator that’s ideal for larger chips. You’ll be able to cover and repair a variety of common body and paint damage issues.

Don’t expect any separate primer, special preparation tools or polishes with the Hycote, so you’ll have to raid the shed for any prep work and the final polish, but it was easy to use and had a decent colour match too. For less than a fiver delivered, you can’t really go wrong. Recommended: M.A.D Touch Up Paint It’s not possible to avoid ever getting stone chips in your paintwork but you can take preventative measures to reduce the risk and protect the paintwork by using a paint protection film like a clear vinyl wrapping. The vinyl wrapping will add an extra layer of protection and is a popular choice for prestige vehicles and those with custom paint that they want to protect – but it’s available to anyone wanting to protect their paintwork. We paid a visit to Autoglass to try out some of their patented windscreen-fitting tech and had a go at changing a screen. Staff from the firm did the preparation, ensuring the car’s exterior and interior were protected and removing the car’s windscreen wipers.Filling in paint chips can seem like a daunting task if you have never attempted it before. There’s the pressure of making sure you only get paint in the chip itself, along with the intensity of having only so much time to repair the chip properly. Langka removes all those barriers to really make paint chip repair an easy process, no matter how much painting experience you have. Your car manufacturer applies paint in several layers and you need to mimic this procedure to get the desired effect. Apply the paint in thin layers and build it up, allowing adequate drying time between each layer. Make sure you keep the paint in the damaged area and do not paint surrounding areas. For even less outlay, there are several DIY options, ranging from pastes to full primer and paint repairs. But are they a false economy? We put eight to the test to find out. Stone chips are a common feature in car paintwork, usually on the bonnet. They create small, deep and very localised damage in the paint. The most effective cure is a bodyshop respray. Yet this is an expensive option, and can cost several hundred pounds. If you are unable to stretch that far, mobile SMART (Small and Medium Area Repair Techniques) operators do an excellent job on a wide variety of scuffs, dings and dents.

Affordable. Paying for a whole new paint job isn’t cheap – it’s a costly investment. Instead of paying to repaint your entire vehicle, you can use a car paint chip repair kit to fix the problem spots on your own. With low prices and only a small fraction of the cost of a traditional paint job, you can restore your vehicle’s exterior on your own. Plus, you won’t have the added expenses or frustrations of having to leave your car at the shop for days or a week until the work is finished. As every conscientious vehicle owner knows, car paint doesn’t stay perfect forever. Scratches, chips and rust spots inevitably develop on even the most well-cared-for vehicles, and that’s why car paint repair kits were invented. When removing stone chips, it takes time, a close paint match and a steady hand. Here are our step-by-step instructions for you to try to fix a stone chip repair on your vehicle:We put each option through its paces and assessed the end result. As well as appearance, we took into account whether the repair was permanent or needed repeating a few weeks later. We also considered whether the effort required, and the price, justified the results. Verdict The ChipEx Paint Repair System allows the simple and safe repair of paint chips, scratches and 'road rash' without the need for the costly intervention of a body shop. Every ChipEx paint kit is hand made to the manufacturer's colour formulation for an exact colour match.

Upon finding a stone chip, many people decide to touch up the paint themselves. This can work for small chips and areas of damage, but there are times when your car should go to a professional for a stone chip repair, such as: Many drivers have one of these Halfords kits in their garage or shed, either for a long-gone old car or something they still own. But that doesn’t necessarily mean you will be able to find the right shade for your car, especially if your model is new, old, or a rare shade. Perhaps understandably, Halfords only caters for a narrow selection of colours on the best-selling cars. From start to finish, Langka provides the tools you need to prepare the paint chip, fill it in, and then seal it from further damage. Included applicator tips help you apply paint to the smallest of paint chips, while the microfiber cloth easily removes any excess paint you might have as you go along. The blob eliminator solution smooths out any spots where you may have applied too much paint. Finally, the sealant ensures the work you just accomplished lasts for the remainder of the vehicle’s lifetime. Before filling in scratches with touch-up paint, stop by your local detail shop or speak with the head detailer at your local dealership. Buffing may correct a lot of the scratches on your vehicle unless they are deep enough to require additional paint. Detail experts should be able to tell you which route is the best.

AMERICAN WARNS AGAINST DR COLOURCHIP

There is nothing to choose between the Mer and Farécla stone chip kits. Both give excellent results, and the instructions supplied make the processes accessible to beginners. Your local dealer will still be pleased to furnish you with a bottle of paint of course, as long as you don’t mind paying the high price that comes with genuine parts. The box you will get over the counter contains two small bottles, one containing the colour coat and the other a lacquer which gives shine and protection. Both are applied using a small brush attached to the lid, in much the same way as ladies will apply nail varnish. riving with a small stone chip in your car’s windscreen should not cause undue safety concerns. In theory, a chip could spread rapidly and shatter your windscreen, but in reality windscreen experts Auto Glass say this is an incredibly unlikely scenario. The laminated design of modern car windscreen glass – windscreens are typically constructed from two layers of glass sandwiched either side of a sheet of vinyl – is incredibly resilient. How To Fix Stone Chips Using Paint Chip Repair Kits Stone chips are one of the most common types of paint damage to occur on vehicles and commonly found on the front bumper and bonnet panels. Stone chips will usually create deep, localised damage to the paint work and it doesn’t have to cost a lot if treated right away. Some classic and prestige cars used to be supplied with a bottle of the factory paint in the glovebox, but those days are long gone and now you’ll be expected to pay for your own. They vary in price and complexity, so we tried five different types of touch-up paint kit to see which did the best job of disguising our damage.

Put on the rubber gloves that come with the kit. These are actually used in the application of the paint. Apply the primer or base coat. Use a very fine brush or paint pen if your kit comes with one. Allow to dry. You can find a windscreen repairer online, but you’re just as likely to find somebody offering insurer-approved repairs in the car park while you shop at your local superstore. Best of all, you generally only have to give the repairer your insurance company details, and they'll invoice the insurer direct on your behalf. Shake the paint Step 1 Paint bottle well, and then use the supplied Chipex paint applicator brush® to dab the paint onto the chipped areas. If the car has suffered 'road rash' (lots of small paint stone chips in one area), put the paint onto a fingertip of the glove, and smear evenly across the road rash, making sure they are all filled.Use car paint chip repair kits on painted surfaces only. For repairing damage to your wheels, seek out a specifically designed wheel repair kit that matches the wheels on your vehicle. Though they must be equally durable, car paints differ greatly from wheel paints. Once the paint has dried, take a very fine wet & dry sanding paper and with a steady hand, sand down the painted area until you have it at the same level as the surrounding paint. For very small paint chips, wrap your sanding paper around the blunt end of a pencil to ensure you don’t scratch the surrounding paint. Using either a cutting compound like T-Cut or a fine wet & dry paper, sand down any raised edges around the paint chip. Do not apply too much pressure when sanding down and be careful not to damage the surrounding clearcoat.