Hey, thinking about having MACCO lay down a new paint job for the Teg before winter hits here in New York. A friend of mine told me to bring my own paint to them to lay down, because their brand they use is cheap. Is their a certain type of paint of should buy? Should I strip all the paint off my car before I give it to them? If you guys know of a good site for paints LMK. I’m looking for a glossy dark gunmetal look. B)
i would reccommend doing the body work yourself and going and finding a reputable body shop and talking with a painter and see how much he would want to paint your car for on the side if you do the prep work for him, or see if he can help.
Macco should only be used if your trying to sell the car just to make it look fresh if its a car your planning on keeping and enjoying dont go to macco even if you supply your own paint they still do a shitty job they dont care about quailty they care abour quanity and how many cars they can get done
This topic has been covered numerous times… search for the word Maaco here and you’l find that your questions have already been asked and answered.
In short, Maaco is like any other business. If you’re only wanting to spend $300, then you’re going to get a poor result… but if you went for one of their higher-end jobs, then you’ll get a better end product.
The issue isn’t so much with the paint that they use… it is how little of it that they use. If you’re paying only $300, do you think that they’re gonna give you 8 coats of clear? No… they’ll spray just enough to get the car covered, and stop there. Same with the actual paint… they’ll spray enough to get the car covered, and move on. They won’t ‘build’ it up because, you aren’t paying enough.
Doing your own prep work is always good, especially if going with a less expensive paint package… pull your moldings off (don’t tape them off, you will start peeling on the edges), if you can do the body work yourself, even better… doing your own sanding is nice too as they don’t spend a whole lot of time on it when doing a budget job.
In all… if you want a QUALITY paint job, you should seriously be paying $1,500+… I’m not saying that the quality of a job is based on its price… simply saying that paint jobs are not cheap, and they are a LOT of work. Call around for quotes if you don’t believe me.
Is maaco a ‘bad’ place? No… they give you exactly what you pay for. If you only want to spend a few bucks, then they will give you a few bucks worth of work.
my car was painted cheap before i bought it. looked like 2 coats, no sanding prior to paint, no body work. looked great for a couple months after i bought the car, then the layers started to separate in spots and flake off.
I’d look into the “$50 roller paint” thing if you want to be cheap about it and still come out on top in the end.
it requires work beyond prep though, all the wet sanding & buffing.
plenty of people here and other sites have done it and the results can be amazing.
Using exterior paint is nearly as bad as a rattle-can job…
Paint that is ‘air dried’ (exterior house paint, aerosol, etc) is going to have very very poor chemical resistance… meaning brake cleaner, or any harsh chemical can (and probably will) cause damage to the finish.
If you indeed rattle can or house-paint your car… if you ever decide to paint it correctly later down the road, ALL of the aerosol/house stuff will have to be stripped off. If you use automotive paint over the aerosol, it will cause lifting and wrinkling, and the paintjob will look like ass.
On the positive side… if you aerosol/roll your car, touch-ups are much MUCH cheaper and easier than on a regular paint job lol.
macco is no go if you do the prep job urself they void their BS warranty and their $300 job is only a single stage paint job, which means no clear coat, single stage paint jobs look nice for a year, 2 years at the most if u take care of it, and then they start to fade. Now a 2 stage job is base coat and clear coat. a good 2 stage lasts 5 years or more depending on how good ur prep job and materials are. im not sure how laws in NY are and weather or not u have to have a license to buy materials but here in cali there are paint supply shops specially for auto paint and body materials, look for one of those and you could price materials for both a single stage and a 2 stage. For a 2 stage you are lookin at about 500 for materials alone and thats just the average. some colors are more pricey and some not so pricey. White is cheapest while reds and metallics are not so cheap. it all depends on what u want.
in all honesty you could go with a white 2 stage for about $200 for material. just keep in mind you would probably only have enough clear for 2 coats so it wont leave a lot of room for error
If I remember right, their Presidential paint job, the $1500+ one includes professional prepping and 2 hours worth of body work included. I am considering having them do my rust repair and prepping it. I know someone who is a professional painter who will spray it.
Maaco in my area does a pretty good job. With their “top” package, you basically get what you’d spend at a regular body shop for a proper paint job. And, it looks good. It all depends on the shop and the people working at it. My uncle painted at the one in my area for 10+ years, and even their mid level $500 jobs looked decent. Their signature package or whatever its called is actually quite detailed, and at the one in my area, they spend a LOT of time going over it with a fine toothed comb, so to speak. I visited a friend who used to work up there and noticed an older mustang that was having the signature paint job done. all the areas that were marked for work (high spots, dings, dents, etc.) were marked. some of which, even though they were marked, i could BARELY notice them, even though it was down to primer. So, with their signature job, you get a pretty good job. At least, the guys in my area take pride in their work. Their cheapest package tends to look “meh”, but bottom line, you get what you pay for. Spend the extra $$ for a good job, and you will receive a good job. Spend low $$ for a quick fix/overnight spray job, and you’ll get exactly that. It’ll look okay for a few months, but then it’ll turn to shat.
Maaco is good if you get the Supreme or Signature packages. Ambassador and Presidential are good if you plan on selling the car. We are talking about 90-93 cars here, and unless you have a boat load of cash I wouldn’t take it to a body shop and waste my money on a car that’s worth maybe 5k KBB since no one who’s going to buy a 90-93 car gives two craps about performance mods. Take a look at the ‘fast’ DAs that sit for sale for months with price tags more than KBB. With these cars the real money is parting them out if you do sell them, unless you’re happy with getting 1-3k.
In closing, Maaco is a good choice for 90-93 Integras unless you have money to throw away for no reason, and if that’s the case I’ll give you my PayPal address.
I would never, ever, ever use crappy paint on my car. I would hire a trusted person in the auto body industry and paint the car, using PPG paint, panel by panel if I had to. It won’t look good, no matter what plain color you use. And it would be a nightmare for the next owner to remove it as they have to remove it completely, down to the bare metal/primer. Plus you have to consider the jambs and engine bay won’t match the OEM vs. Maaco paintjob and the overspray issue. I see cars for sale with bad paint jobs all the time and I wouldn’t touch them with a 10 foot pole!
lol you got married on the same day as me…congrats man!
Sweet! and BTW I’m a girl…