Well, almost 2 weeks and 800 miles after getting my car, my first serious paint issue came about. Here's a little background..

This MINI is my fourth car, first a Toyota 4runner, then a BMW all wheel drive wagon, then a Subaru Outback, and now the Clubman S. Each and every one of these cars was cared for impeccably. For lack of better words, I am unbelievably **** about how well I care for both the interior and exterior of my vehicles. That means AT LEAST washes once per week, wax/seal every coupple months, buff, polish, etc etc. I have a whole routine scheduled for all my vehicles that includes my daily chores, weekly, monthly, bi monthly, yearly, etc etc. Plain and simple, I just like to have my cars look flawless 50,000+ miles down the road. So far, so good.

Anyway, on my way back from Sacramento yesterday, on highway 49 (legendarily dangerous 2 lane highway), a rock flew up and hit my drivers side door. Immediately my heart sank, as I know nothing could make such a noise and have no affect on the paint. I pulled over at a gas station and found two chips right beneath my rear view mirror. One of which is down to the metal, the other is down to the primer. Needless to say, it nearly ruined my day. Two terrible looking chips in my brand new, freshly sealed british racing green mini.

Fortunately this story has a happy ending, or at least I hope it does. My dad hit a deer about a year ago in his Honda Ridgeline while going about 55 mph. It caused some serious damage to his truck, so the Honda dealership recommended Jake Thomlinson & Co. for the auto repair. Jake specializes in Porsches but does absolutely anything you throw at him, and does a fantastic job. My dad was so unbelievably happy with the job done, and the way he was treated that he recommended them to just about everyone he knew.

I decided to take my Clubman into Thomlinson's place to get a quote on fixing my door. Having absolutely no idea how to go about such a process (whether the entire door needed repainting, or if it could be filled, etc etc), I was expecting a very high price to fix a small problem, and I expected to have it simply not be worth it. Jake was not in town, but one of his employees inspected the car, and assured me that Jake would have absolutely no problem completely repairing the damage. I was glad to hear that, but when I asked about what it would cost, I expected something unreasonable. He replied, "Oh no, we wouldn't charge you for something like that. Your family has had lots of work done here before, and this is a small job. It's on us!"

If only you could've seen the look on my face when I was told this. So, long story short, Jake will be in town next week and I'll drop off my car for two days, and it will get fixed, all pro bono.

So the moral of the story is, if you are in the Auburn/Roseville/Rocklin/Sacramento/Colfax/Grass Valley/Nevada City area and need auto repair work done, go to Jake Thomlinson & Co. You will be treated really well, and their work is top notch. I'm not affiliated with this company at all, but I believe they are one of the few companies out there that still knows how business should be done.

 

Glad to hear it turned out OK. Keep us posted when the work gets done. Maybe take some before and after photos, we love those on this forum

Mark

 

yah, i was hoping to see some picts...

 

Here's some pics I tried to take. I couldn't really get any good pictures in my garage lighting. I'll try to get some better pics tomorrow outside after I wash it. I'll try to get some better pics in the context of my whole door so you can see how terrible it really looks

Imagine the look on my face when I saw this on the side of my shiny beauty!

 

Great story! As I was reading it, I realized that's almost the exact same spot where I recently got 4 tiny little rock chips which I'm trying to repair myself with touch-up paint (see my new thread just posted in this forum, "Best choice for touch-up paint?". Ironic that they would both be in the same spot, which, quite frankly, I figured was an odd place to randomly get a rock chip - must be the design or aerodynamics of the door. Unfortunately, I don't have friends in high places to take care of it for me, but I'm glad it will work out so well for you! I, too, am incredibly particular about maintaining my cars so it bothers me quite a bit on such a new one. (Of course, I also know it's just a thing, and I'll get over it! ) Can't wait to hear about/see the finished result!

 

dr colorchip works great "

 

http://drcolorchip.com/

 

does mini dealership carry colors that are discontinured?

 

Yep, I just got some JB touch up paint from my dealership.

 

Yeah but be prepared to wait (depending on the color).. It took months to get Solar Red.

 

That's great you are happy with the service of that shop. Just my 2 cents. There are two ways to fix this.

1.) Touch Up
2.) Repaint the entire panel

The impacts appear small enough that Touch Up will work. Although its very difficult to repair metallics perfectly with touch up, the area seems small enough that it won't be a big deal, so that's likely what they will do.

If done correctly, they will apply touch up, wetsand the painted area, the buff and polish it.

The alternative to fixing chips on metallic paint is to repaint the entire panel because if you tried to paint just the damaged area the metallic flakes will never match with the existing paint and you will get a blend line--and dark/light spot when viewed from different angles. That costs money and time wouldn't be done for free no matter how much they loved you guys, lol.

Richard

 

Dr colorchip works great and color matches perfect

 

I wondered about the ease of touching up BRG myself. I've tried touch up paint on my old Miata, and it was an unmitigated disaster, and something I'll never repeat. Sorry to piggyback on this thread, but I have a near identical issue. I have a BRG R56 that got its first rock chip - the paint is dinged all the way to metal, and it comes with a little dent too. I'm thinking if nothing else, it needs a touch up to prevent a rust situation, but I'd like to have it look good for my sanity. Of course it has to be on the drivers side so I have to look at it every day. If one doesn't feel they can fix this themselves, and they don't have a long history with an autobody shop, how do you go about this repair? Can any autobody do this? Does the dealer service center do this kind of thing? How much can one expect it to cost?

Blackdog

 

Thanks Richard. The guy that helped me at Thomlinson's said that repainting the entire panel would be way more work and money than its worth for such a small issue. He said that touching up will fix the problem 98%. That's good enough for me! I figure as long as it's better than it is now, I'm happy.

We'll see how it goes on Monday. I considered filling the chip myself with a touch-up kit, but I tried to do so a couple times on my 4-runner and got mediocre results. I figured I'd let the pros handle it this time.

 

Sheesh, do you work for them or something