Concrete pillar wins. Need paint advice

[leezard]

Backed up to a concrete pillar in a parking garage. My fault completely. Cameras were dusted with salt and proximity sensors disabled.

Not going through insurance, so going through more inexpensive methods. Was able to find a mobile PDR guy willing to take the job. He pulled it out to about 70%. Something I have to live with, which I have come to terms with.

Paint wise it’s down to bare metal aluminum. I hear aluminum doesn’t rust, so could I just paint over the scratches? Rivian touch up pen has clear coat, but no primer. Would it be better to get a kit with primer, base coat, and clear coat? I see some online. I don’t have experience with sanding/rotary, and not sure if I’m willing to try, in order to not make it worse. Worth going to a professional paint shop? Suggestions appreciated thanks.

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[Donald Stanfield]

If you go professional they will most likely have to spray a large area to blend. Your tailgate and rear 1/4 will probably have to be painted. This will give you the best results but will be 5k or more.

 

[sherold]

Heads up, that panel in the R1T is steel, and is likely the same in the R1S.

If you are happy with the PDR to the level they have it and are ready for paint, I would have a professional body shop take care of it. They'll want to paint the whole panel and blend with surrounding areas. I would also guess they'd want to use a superficial repair (body filler) which would help return the appearance of the panel to "new".

Trying to take care of this yourself with no experience will very likely not give you the results you want. Touch up will help to blend the scratches and reduce the contrast with the rest of the panel but, it will still be obvious. Painting is not a forgiving process and can become time consuming very quickly. Screwing up and sanding back down to restart again & again. If you do want to tackle it yourself, you can do enough research online to arm yourself with the proper tools/materials and techniques to do an amateur job, but that is likely not worth the investment for one repair. I would definitely recommend getting some scrap pieces to practice on before attempting anything on the vehicle if you went this route.

 

[bike123.com]

Backed up to a concrete pillar in a parking garage. My fault completely. Cameras were dusted with salt and proximity sensors disabled.

Not going through insurance, so going through more inexpensive methods. Was able to find a mobile PDR guy willing to take the job. He pulled it out to about 70%. Something I have to live with, which I have come to terms with.

Paint wise it’s down to bare metal aluminum. I hear aluminum doesn’t rust, so could I just paint over the scratches? Rivian touch up pen has clear coat, but no primer. Would it be better to get a kit with primer, base coat, and clear coat? I see some online. I don’t have experience with sanding/rotary, and not sure if I’m willing to try, in order to not make it worse. Worth going to a professional paint shop? Suggestions appreciated thanks.

We will be watching replies - have accumulated several like that
in rear quarters, tailgate, and a tunnel door. I’d be happy with a pdr job like that !
Did they press from inside or glue on a pulling tab?

 

[leezard]

We will be watching replies - have accumulated several like that
in rear quarters, tailgate, and a tunnel door. I’d be happy with a pdr job like that !
Did they press from inside or glue on a pulling tab?

From the outside. They used some sort of pull gun, heat gun, hammer like tools. I think tooling is fairly limited, since it was done mobile. He said he would have taken the rear taillight off to go from the inside but he was worried that pushing from the inside would cause the paint to crack even more, since aluminum (assuming it is aluminum) like a soda can is trickier to worth with.

 

[leezard]

Heads up, that panel in the R1T is steel, and is likely the same in the R1S.

If you are happy with the PDR to the level they have it and are ready for paint, I would have a professional body shop take care of it. They'll want to paint the whole panel and blend with surrounding areas. I would also guess they'd want to use a superficial repair (body filler) which would help return the appearance of the panel to "new".

Trying to take care of this yourself with no experience will very likely not give you the results you want. Touch up will help to blend the scratches and reduce the contrast with the rest of the panel but, it will still be obvious. Painting is not a forgiving process and can become time consuming very quickly. Screwing up and sanding back down to restart again & again. If you do want to tackle it yourself, you can do enough research online to arm yourself with the proper tools/materials and techniques to do an amateur job, but that is likely not worth the investment for one repair. I would definitely recommend getting some scrap pieces to practice on before attempting anything on the vehicle if you went this route.

Thanks for the advice. Would it do any harm to do pen touch up, and bring it in for professional bodywork and paint later on?

 

[NY_Rob]

The whole side of the R1 vehicles are a special aluminum/steel alloy made for Rivian. It may rust if exposed, I guess you'll find out soon enough.

I'd bring it to a full service PDR shop vs mobile PDR where they will pull the bed liner and attack it from the inside. Once they're done, just bring it to a high end body shop and have them finish with a minimal of filler and respray.

 

[bike123.com]

From the outside. They used some sort of pull gun, heat gun, hammer like tools. I think tooling is fairly limited, since it was done mobile. He said he would have taken the rear taillight off to go from the inside but he was worried that pushing from the inside would cause the paint to crack even more, since aluminum (assuming it is aluminum) like a soda can is trickier to worth with.

After reading and hearing about high five figure fender bender repairs, we’ve been afraid to address the many dents n dings.
Taking off our tailgate light could be four figures- it was painstakingly reconstructed by us from all the bite size pieces we could sweep up.

 

[sherold]

Thanks for the advice. Would it do any harm to do pen touch up, and bring it in for professional bodywork and paint later on?

No harm in that by any means. I actually would suggest it to help prevent any corrosion or damage to the exposed metal. It will also give you an opportunity to use a touch-up pen and experience how meticulous painting is. I guarantee it will be ugly and give you a new respect for how paint is applied to vehicles .

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