Hello!

 

I am looking for some opinions on what I should do with my car's roof.

 

Yesterday I was travelling home along a dual carriageway so was doing about 70, when there was an almighty bang on the roof. I pulled over in a lay-by and the pictures attached show what I saw! Not overly impressed, and not sure what caused it, I was following a van so I suspect he threw up a stone and I was just unlucky (or lucky that it didn't hit the windscreen!!).

 

The dent is around 4cm across and the gouge is about 4cm long. There is no paint damage in the dent, but as you can see the gouge has gone through the white vinyl and the paintwork leaving bare metal. The car is an 04 plate Fiesta so I don't want to spend loads, but I was interested in your thoughts on a fix. I reckon I will have do something soonish to stop the metal rusting.

 

 

Any thoughts would be greatly received.

 

Matt

 

id say your looking at the whole roof being repainted

PDR to pull the dent out, touch up pen for the bare metal then wrap the roof?? 

Thanks for your replies, I did have the thought that the whole roof might need repainting.

 

But I do like the idea of making it smooth and then vinyl wrapping the roof!

I would say do the following.

1. Put some detailing tape at the edges of the stripes
2. Remove the stripes
3. Use a dent pull kit to get the dent out. I have had success with AM-tech stuff before and its only around £12
4. Then paint the area to stop rust
5. wrap roof or apply new stripes.

 

I would say do the following.

1. Put some detailing tape at the edges of the stripes
2. Remove the stripes
3. Use a dent pull kit to get the dent out. I have had success with AM-tech stuff before and its only around £12
4. Then paint the area to stop rust
5. wrap roof or apply new stripes.

 

 

This is sort of what I was thinking, but I didn't know you could get such kits! Will have a look into them now. Thanks

As long as the dent is pulled so water doesn't stay in the roof and you can't see that it's dented then it doesn't matter if you get the right shade of blue as long as it covers the scratch and you wrap it. Seams like you're quite lucky that it hit where the stripe is.

I agree, I think I was quite lucky.

 

The current plan of attack (using some of the comments above) is to:

- Pull the dent out

- Take off the vinyl stripe

- Sand and fill the gouge

- Touch up some paint over the filler

- Re-apply a stripe

 

Hoping to start this weekend

Dont go pulling the dent out with welding on rods and pulling or the likes.

 

Ask at a body shop about dent removal, there are several easy ways now and a roof can be easy without removing the headlining.

(sometimes with the application of just heat then cold, or something with a bit more of a vibe.)

 

As to stopping rust, that always best done the same way,

as soon as possible that metal is exposed, get some rust inhibitor on, or Nail Varnish/lacquer, or any old dab of paint, 

you will be removing it later anyway.

 

george

Hi George,

 

Thanks for your reply. I wasn't going to use the welding rods route with the dent removal, I would like to keep the paint intact if I can.

 

As for rust, I currently have put some tape over the gouge, but I should probably do something a little better and you are right it will be coming off at some point anyway!

 

Matt