#auto body repairs port coquitlam

[tomsautobody-blog]

Alex Wardle Tom's Custom Autobody

http://tomscustomautobody.com      604-931-3441

Mark:  Hi, it’s Mark from Top Local; we’re here with Alex Wardle of Tom’s Custom Autobody in Port Coquitlam, British Columbia;  how’re you doing today Alex?

Alex:  I’d doing great.

Mark:  So we’re going to talk a little bit about key scratches which is something that I’ve got some experience with; I guess the target vehicle today was a 2014 Lexus RX350. What happened with this vehicle?

Alex:  Well, this vehicle was like a lot of vehicles out there, the customer had damage on it that he didn’t realize was so bad.  It came into our store and we had a look at it we kind of formulated the car been keyed across the car.  The original thought that the scratches could just be polished out and unfortunately with key scratches they really can’t.  So I’m going to bring up some photos here and just show you.  So this is the subject vehicle, it’s a 2014 Lexus RX350 and the colour on it is silver lining metallic; it’s got a specific flake, it’s a very nice colour and it’s very common in our marketplace here in metro Vancouver, very common car and so what had happened was this gentleman’s car had been at the, at one of the larger shopping centres and it came back and his car looked like it had been vandalized and it was clearly vandalized, you can see here that one key scratch coming across the back door, someone had gone so far as to actually physically key scratch the front bumper and damage across the back door and our customer knew that the damage on the front bumper, he knew that this damage on the front bumper could not be polished out.  He figured that he had to have that painted but over here on the doors the damage actually looked not as significant, he thought that these scratches just could be buffed out which is a real common, which is a real common kind of thought from consumers is that the damage is never as bad as it is.  Well if you run your nail across the scratch, what happens is if it sticks on that clear coat, that shows you that the scratch has gone through the coats of clear and actually down to the base layer of paint and actually has damaged that paint base layer of this silver lining metallic so essentially what has to happen is this car ends up having to be refinished and so at the advice that, at our advice he made a comprehensive claim  with his insurance provider, his deductible was fairly minimal, I think it was $300, relative to the total damage on the car so if we go back to the photo of the car, essentially he had damage, key scratch damage from the front bumper across the fender and across the two doors and onto the rear quarter.  So it didn’t look all that bad when you looked at the car but when, once you saw the dollar value of the repair it was quite extensive, it was about $4,500 in damage and essentially here’s the finished product.  We ended up having to repaint the quarter by the tail lights, the back doors as I suggested and then we also repainted the front bumper and this is car just after it had been demasked and come out of the spray booth.  So it’s a fairly significant amount of damage and it requires, it requires, really this car took about three to four days of work to actually prep and get the whole side of the car ready to be refinished and then there’s a whole extensive process around matching this, matching this metallic, getting it right because you’re painting the side of the car and obviously, you know it’s something that we guarantee so we want to make sure that the preparation is done, it’s done really well and all of the, all of what makes this paint job good really comes into the prep work, comes into everything that happens before it goes into the spray booth and then our painter will come in and paint it and refinish it and then when it comes out it actually now goes into our detail department where it is here now and it actually gets polished and so it goes back to the customer looking great.  It should come back just looking like it’s came out of the, came out of the show room.

Mark:  So when you guys are painting that are you actually going up into the pillars and onto the hood and I don’t know how, to get the blend?

Alex:  Well in this case we didn’t have to blend onto the hood because there was very little damage on the front fender but we would’ve blended the colour through the front fender, we also then would have painted the bumper, the doors and so forth so even if there’s a little bit of damage, generally if that damage is within 14 inches of the other panel we would blend the colour across, especially with the metallic because the metallic flakes will land differently than when it was first, when it first went through the factory and so it’s really important that if you don’t want to see a difference in the colour of the metallic that you blend as much as possible and that allows for a really good refinish.

Mark:  So there you go; if your baby has been scratched by some evil person at the mall or somewhere else like happened to me at my Jetta on both sides then these are the guys to call.  Tom’s Custom Autobody in Port Coquitlam, they’re serving Burnaby, Surrey, Coquitlam, Port Coquitlam, Port Moody, hell all of Vancouver, give them a call 604-931-3441, they’re super busy right now as we’ve had a lot of snow and it’s not normal for us in Vancouver.   Check out their website, tomscustomautobody.com .  Thanks Alex.

Alex:  Thanks Mark, see ya.

service@tomscustomautobody.com

https://plus.google.com/108373087426493182876/about

[coquitlamexpress01-blog]

How to Drive Safely in Low Visibility

Do you have the skills needed to drive in low visibility? Some people might panic when they find themselves driving in heavy fog or smog. Employ the following safety tips so you can avoid going for auto body collision repair:

1.Always monitor the weather.

Make it a habit to check your weather application before driving out. This will help you make preparations for the kind of weather that you might encounter. If there is going to be heavy fog, you would want to check for alternate routes or skip using your vehicle and just commute.

2.Turn on your low beam headlight and reduce your speed.

Your low beam headlight will help you see what is right in front of you. If you reduce your speed, you can react faster to potential danger and also be able to take necessary turns.

3.When pulling off your current roadway, wait until you can find a rest area or an exit first.

Don’t just stop in the middle of the road as the cars behind you will surely collide with your vehicle.

4.Avoid driving distractions and make sure you and all your passengers are buckled up.

Practice safe driving in order to reduce the likelihood of a crash.

If you can find a rest area, stay there until the fog clears up. If you get in an accident, call for help right away. Have your vehicle towed and taken to an auto body in collision repair shop such as Coquitlam Express Auto Body to have the damages assessed and fixed right away.

To know more about auto body collision repair please visit the website.

[tomsautobody-blog]

Alex Wardle - Tom's Custom Autobody

http://tomscustomautobody.com      604-931-3441

Mark:  Hi, it’s Mark from Top Local, we’re here with Alex Wardle of Tom’s Custom Autobody in Port Coquitlam, British Columbia; how’re you doing this morning Alex?

Alex:  Fantastic, how are you Mark?

Mark:  Good, so we’re going to talk about a 2006, 2016?

Alex:  2006 Nissan Pathfinder, yeah.

Mark:  So what was the challenge with this vehicle?

Alex:  Well the challenge with this vehicle is its age, so I’m just going to put pull up the photos for you so you can quickly have a look, so the challenge here is the age of the car and the amount of damage.  So as your vehicle gets older, obviously the value of the vehicle depreciates and when you get into an accident, what happens if your value of the vehicle is less than roughly seventy percent, if the value is, sorry if the repair is about seventy percent of the value of the vehicle the insurance companies will tend to want to write it off.  Well a lot of vehicles and a lot of customers, they like each other and so this customer here who is driving this Nissan Pathfinder didn’t want to lose his vehicle to a write off because he knew the maintenance of the vehicle and he knew that any amount of money that the insurance company gave him for his older Pathfinder was not going to get him a replaced vehicle so essentially what we did here is, this customer as you can see was in a fairly substantial front end accident on the passenger side and I’m just going to pull up the next photo and you can see here that the, he’d hit something pretty hard.  Hood is completely destroyed, fender destroyed, headlights, grille, bumper, all those pieces got replaced and some of the, some of them concerns when we started to look at this was we first of all we checked to see whether the airbag modules were ok and whether airbags had gone off and in this case they hadn’t.  Some people will be surprised about that but there’s actually no damage to the frame rail where the airbag sensor is mounted and so when we go back to this photo here, this arrows pointing, because the other concern that we have is that possibly that the vehicle has shifted from the passenger side to the driver’s side, it’s shifted over, just based on the fact that it got hit on the corner.  All those things were ok, airbags didn’t go off, and the actual rad support and the vehicle wasn’t, the vehicle wasn’t shifted, there was no frame damage, so that allowed us to put together a repair plan, the insurance approved the repair plan and you know a week later we had this Nissan Pathfinder looking back to brand-new for the customer and so here’s a couple of shots here of the car when you know, upon, upon completion and essentially you know, the car is looking back to brand new and better than brand new because it’s paint prior to the accident was a little bit damaged and so we were able to fix the chips, fix the chips on some of the fenders on the driver’s side when we blended that, when we blended that fender to match the paint and so we actually got the front end looking better than it was before it came in, so that’s, that is, that’s what we did with that Nissan Pathfinder.

Mark:  So what was replaced on the car, so the fender was that a new fender or did you, was that and a new bumper, a new hood as well?

Alex:  That’s right, so we would have put a new fender, a new hood, and a new bumper and new lights, and a new grille in the front.  We have a price matching program with Nissan and so we would have gone out and got Nissan to match pricing of aftermarket parts and we’d have put on OEM parts there to make sure that the customer is getting his car back to as close to original as possible and so all those parts be new on the car, they’re not repaired just because those parts are beyond repair, so all the stuff you saw on the front end there was brand new.

Mark:  Beauty. So if you have a well-loved vehicle that’s been in a bit of a fender bender, these are the guys to see in North Burnaby, Port Coquitlam, Coquitlam in the tri-cities area, Maple Ridge even North Surrey get a lot of customers.  Tom’s Custom Auto Body, you can reach them at 604-931-3441, book ahead, they’re real busy or they’re at 1830 Kingsway, Port Coquitlam.  Thanks Alex.

Alex:  Thanks very much, bye.

service@tomscustomautobody.com

https://plus.google.com/108373087426493182876/about

[tomsautobody-blog]

Tom’s Custom Autobody 2016 Lexus RX 350 Body Repair

Alex Wardle

http://tomscustomautobody.com

604-931-3441

1830 Kingsway, Port Coquitlam, BC

service@tomscustomautobody.com

Mark: Hi it’s Mark from Top Local, we’re here with Alex Wardle of Tom’s Custom Autobody in Port Coquitlam, award winning, excellent autobody repair shop for the Tri-Cities area,  how’re you doing today Alex?

Alex: Great, enjoying the cold weather and the snow

Mark: Yeah, I bet you’re enjoying the cold, snowy, icy mess out there

Alex: Yeah it makes for busy times

Mark: I bet, so we’re going to talk about a Lexus, a 2015 Lexus RX350, what’s different about this repairing on this vehicle?

Alex: Sure, what’s different about the vehicle I’m about to show you is the colour, so Lexus has decided to bring out what’s called a Matador red and I’m just going to bring up the photo here and show you, it is probably one of the hardest colours in the industry to paint and to get right. And so what we’ve got here is actually a 2016 Lexus RX350, and this is a car after we’re done, we painted the two doors and we matched it to the rear quarter and bumper, and you can see all the lovely snow in our parking lot there, but what’s really hard about this is getting sure that the metallic and the metallic flake matches across the car so you don’t have any colour imbalances. So what makes kind of our process a little different than a lot of other shops is we’ve got a brand new, state of the art, 31 foot spray tech booth with brand new lighting. That helps because then my painter can see and check the colour clearly, but one of the other secrets of our industry is that we also use what is called a RapidMatch X5 camera. So Lexus has on the engine bay of their car has the colour and that’ll give you three variance but what we also do one step further is where we actually can take a photograph of the colour and that colour then will get translated into into an extra coat and what allows us, it allows us to adjust the variance to get the exact match based on what that car has, because each car, even though it has the same colour comes down the assembly line at Lexus or at Ford or wherever it may be, will be slightly different. So we use this colour, this is provided, we use this colour camera and this is provided to us by PPG who is our paint manufacturer, and it really ensures a perfect colour match and that’s kind of what makes us a little bit different is that we really strive to make sure that the colour is perfect. So when you get your Lexus back, you can see the different shades of the colour on the doors, depending on where you are in the door and the reflection there, match perfectly when you get the car back.

Mark: So that sounds like really complicated process, is that why a lot of other companies don’t do it?

Alex: It’s a complicated process. A lot of suppliers just don’t have that technology to give to their stores. That camera itself is about $6500 dollars, so you’ve got to really invest in the equipment, the spray booth and the camera equipment and really good paint, really makes a difference. And there’s all kinds of variations of paint that you can buy and all kinds of variations of clear coat. So we buy the top level paint available to us and then we put on the best clear coat that we can. We don’t skimp with our materials because that is what’s going to last on the car for the next ten years that you own it, is that clear coat and the colour. You know a lot of shops can get the repair right but the colour is what you live with every day and that’s got to be really right.

Mark: So I can imagine there is a lot of training and experience with your technicians that is required in order to operate even all this stuff and make it work, is that true?

Alex: Yes, that’s very true. So our painters, we have two painters they go through training every year, they do about 16 hours of training and they go back to the manufacturer, they train in state of the art booths as well, similar to ours, and essentially what happens is they’ll go through, they’ll learn how to use the colour camera, they learn how to do a spray out card to maximize the minimum difference in the variation between the paints and that really, the continual training along with the best paint and technology, really provides a really good finish.

Mark: So there you go, if you’ve got a new vehicle and it’s got a fancy paint job and you want it to look fantastic again, in case of life’s little issues and ice and snow, these are the guys to call in Port Coquitlam, Coquitlam, Burnaby, New West, even north Surrey, they get a lot of customers. Tom’s Custom Autobody, you can reach them at 604-931-3441 or check out their website tomscustomautobody.com. Thanks a lot Alex

Alex: Thanks very much

https://plus.google.com/108373087426493182876/about

[tomsautobody-blog]

http://tomscustomautobody.com      604-931-3441

Mark:  Hi, it’s Mark from Top Local; we’re here with Alex Wardle of Tom’s Custom Autobody in Coquitlam, Port Coquitlam; how’re you doing Alex?

Alex:  I’d doing great and yourself?

Mark:  Good, so we’re going to talk about a recent repair on a pretty new, fancy, fancy Mercedes-Benz, the 2014 E63 AMG; what was going on with this car?

Alex:  Well this is, this is for the E Class sedan, this is as fancy as a it gets and so what I want to talk about today is just when you’re choosing a repair shop to really choose someone who knows how to detect the damage and so what we’re going to do is we’re going to look at this Mercedes and this Mercedes was broken into right before Christmas so I’m just going to pull up the photos right now and so what we’ve got here is this, this is a, this Mercedes Benz here is now after it’s been repaired so what we’re going to just go back here and I’ll show you the damage.  So the damage here looks like any other regular day break-in and what you got here is someone has smashed the glass and just broken in and essentially gone in through that passenger side window and subsequently the glass has landed kind of as you can see where my blue arrows are there on the center console, on the seat, on the floor mats and they come in over the, over the dashboard. So when you’re dealing with a very high-end car or for that matter with any car that’s had glass breakage you know that normally when someone looks at their car they instantly look to see what they have lost here, right, so in this case the cigarette lighters still there and some garbage there on the seat and they also look right at the glass, just see okay I got to replace the glass.  Well a real true look at it shows that there are nicks and scratches out of the paint on the door so automatically above and beyond the fact that the glass got to get replaced on this car, this door has to get painted.  Well as you can see this is a pearl white Mercedes, so it’s just more than just painting the door, it actually is now actually painting the door and then blending the front fender and painting the rear door and when we go back into the interior, you know once, once we had cleaned up seat and vacuumed out all the glass there didn’t appear to be much damage to the car but on closer inspection these are very high-end seats.   Their ventilated which means that they cool as well as heat and so the ventilation as means that they’re perforated, well, there’s some scratches and nick’s in there, in that perforation.  The insurance company in this case did not want to pay to fix the ventilation, did not want to pay to fix the, did not want pay to fix the, sorry to replace the seat, they only wanted to fix it and so, and originally they didn’t want to pay to fix it so what Adam did through his negotiation with the insurance company we actually got the insurance company to replace these seat covers and to replace the dashboard.  Standard procedure in a lot of shops is just to have someone sublet coming to repair, well on a ultra-high end vehicle that repair is just not going to stand the test of time and it’s not going to look good so we actually went back to ICBC in this case, negotiated with them and got them to replace the seat covers and you know, just to give you an idea of the value of these two parts where the blue arrows are, that was worth about ten thousand dollars in additional, additional cost to replace those two items but you’ve got a vehicle that was worth a hundred and fifty thousand dollars plus new and so essentially you know, that you got to maintain that vehicle, you’ve got to keep that vehicle right and so it just shows you that looking at it and really looking at the damage and being concise with it really helps get that car back to pre-loss condition.  So it’s very important, also we ended up painting the rear door here, the main front door on the side and then the fender and as you can see here, we’ve got a very good colour match with this pearl white. As we talked about last time we do use our, we do use our paint camera as well as the spray out car to make sure that pearl white is bang on right and that car gets back to pre-loss condition which is our mandate.

Mark:  So when you’re negotiating with ICBC or any insurance company, I’m sure that can be a bit of tricky, difficult thing, is it because you’ve got such long term relationships with them or you’re more a more preferred shop, like what gives you a little bit extra clout or you’re just really persuasive?

Alex:  Well it comes down to good honest management.  We’ve, we’ve been dealing with ICBC at Tom’s since 1978 so over those years we’ve built up a trust between both parties and so they will come down and view the car and they know that if they’ve got to come look at something, we ask them to come down and look at it, there’s obviously a reason for that and so it takes that trust level between partners to look at it and say listen we can’t fix this and get it right for the customer, so in this case we have to replace it and the ICBC and any insurance company’s mandate is to bring your car back to pre-loss condition and so you just need someone on both sides of the table to understand that, to make sure your vehicle gets repaired right.

Mark:  So there you go, if you need some repairs on your high-end or regular vehicle, body repairs, these are the guys to call in Port Coquitlam, Coquitlam, Burnaby, New Westminster or even North Surrey.  Tom’s Custom Autobody, you can reach them at   604-931-3441 or check out their website tomscustomautobody.com. Thanks a lot Alex.

Alex:  Thanks, have a great day.

service@tomscustomautobody.com

https://plus.google.com/108373087426493182876/about

[coquitlamexpress01-blog]

How to Ensure That Your Teenager is Not Driving Distracted

Distracted driving accounts for a large percentage of road accidents. Teens are behind many of these accidents. Whether it is using their hand phones while driving, eating while maneuvering the vehicle or listening to blaring sound of music, these are distractions that teenagers should learn how to avoid.

The first thing parents can do is to lead by example. You can expect your children to follow traffic rules and not to answer phone calls while driving if you’re doing the same. Children watch and they learn from you so if you think it’s a good idea to use your phone while driving, they will too. Educate them on road risks. It is a good idea to enroll them in driving classes so they can learn defensive driving better. They will also learn from driving schools the results of driving distractedly.

Constantly remind your kids. Drill these reminders in their head even if you’re starting to sound like a broken record. Kids might appear annoyed when their parents nag them but they actually listen.

Let them know the consequences of distracted driving. If they know what potential injuries they can sustain, they will know how to be extra cautious. Additionally, you can also impose consequences if they speed or drive distracted. Let them work to pay off the repair bills. You can also withdraw their privilege in using the car.

In case your teenager driver damages your vehicle due to distracted driving, take it immediately to a Port moody auto repair shop such as Coquitlam Express Auto Body. The auto repair in Port Moody shop will ensure that it will be fixed so that it is safe to drive again.

To know more about Port Moody auto repair please visit the website.

[coquitlamexpress01-blog]

Why You Shouldn’t Wait Until Summer to Have Your Car Dent Fixed

Got a small dent that you’re waiting until summer to get fixed? Many people think small dents are nothing to worry about. After all, nobody’s going to notice if the car has a dent in the middle of winter anyway. If you’re driving around a dented car during winter and spring, you’re probably doing a lot of damage to your car.

Winter is such a harsh season but it is especially harsher on cars due to the salt on the road. The salt, when it gets on the scratched surface of your car that often goes along with the dents and dings, can cause corrosion. If you wait until summer, you might be dealing with a bigger corrosion problem by then. Rust can settle in. Rain during spring can also worsen the problem. Don’t be surprised if the small dent you acquired a few months back already looks worse by the time summer arrives.

Don’t take a simple dent problem lightly, especially if the surface paint has been scratched off and the metal parts of your car’s exterior have been exposed. Go for Port Moody auto repair right away and have the problem fixed. Your car is in good hands at a reliable auto repair in Port Moody such as Coquitlam Express Auto Body who uses green methods in fixing dents and painting your vehicle. The sooner you have the dent fixed by an experienced auto body shop, the less likely you are to spend a lot of money on it.

To know more about Port Moody auto repair please visit the website.