Im thinking of getting my Expedition repainted black. I dont know diddly squat about paint or what to look for in a shop. Can anyone give any suggestions on what to look for, type/brand of paint. Etc. Im not doing this anytime soon as Ive spent entirely to much money this month, but just thought id start checking around to see what the best approach would be.

Thanks!

 

Oh man! If it's done right, it's gonna cost ya a ton of money.

They'll have to remove a lot of parts from the vehicle to do the job right. Door panels, latches, trim, weather seals, etc. are all coming off. Luggage racks, trim, mouldings, bumpers, grill, etc. come off too. A lot of stuff will have to be masked under the hood too.

If they don't pull all the parts off, it will look like it was repainted.

Before you ask, I don't know how much it will cost. I had my old truck repainted in the original color and that job, including a bit of ding repairs, cost $2,000 back around '95.

 

Maybe green isnt so bad after al eh?

 

Well, you know where I live, so you can just imagine just how expensive everything here is. The paint job I paid for was done by the best shop in the area. They removed all the trim, etc. so you couldn't tell that it was ever repainted. If they didn't do that, you'd find places where the paint either fused to the trim parts or got under the masking.

Yeah, I walked in there sorta expecting to pay something closer to what Earl Scheib (sp?) advertised. In place of a cheap paint job, I ended up paying thru the nose and ended up with paint that was indistinguishable from the factory job.

 

Well if I did it I would not want to be able to tell the difference between factory and what not. I was in an accelerated buy mode before we left Texas to make sure my wife had something to drive after her Thunderchicken exploded on I35

Finding a preowned Black Expy with my **** list of what I wanted on it proved not so easy a task In Big D so I settled for everything I wanted minus black paint. Guess I can live with it, 2K can get alot of things probably more worth the value seeing as there is nothing wrong with the current paint job.

Thanks for the info Dennis!

Randy

 

I was about to post the same question myself about getting my truck repainted, the only difference being changing the color from Black to Silver. I really like the silver on the platinum edition Lexus's. I have to graduate college and get a job first, but after that, getting rid of that black paint is number one on my list of things to do.

 

Black is the only color on a vehicle I like. My truck is black and I searched for a Black Expy before buying the Green one. But Im not willing to shell out 2K to change a color when my paint is just fine

 

Make sure you get an especially good paint shop because black is an extremely hard color to paint well. As for me i am getting my truck repainted from the factory wild strawberry to Dupont Boyd Red, it just screams "i'm speeding pull me over" but i like it. When it comes to trucks it has to be big, it has to be Ford, and it has to be red.

-Jon

 

Hey Swofford, As Dennis said there is a lot of work to be done when changing colors. At my dads paint shop we used to get white jeep cherokees and paint them Green for the u.s. dept of forestry, its a paint in the ****. And with some of the body shops Ive seen around these days I wouldnt even try it. I called my Uncle to get a price quote for my buddies 62 galaxie, and to repaint the same color he said 3 grand and thats a discount. just my 2 cents.

 

Ive pretty much talked myself out of it. I dont need to spend the money and have a chance of it being worse after than it is now. The paint is flawless on it now except its Green

 

yeah I've looked into this as well. One thing you can do to save money if you really do want it repainted is to a lot of the work yourself. You'll have to make good friends with some paint shop because some won't let you do it yourself, but find a good one and you'll be set. I'm not talking the actual painting, but the prep work and the final work. When a friend of mine (webmaster over at explorer4x4.com) got his painted, he took out all the trim the carpet, the seats, any window trim or body trim he could and I believe he even did a lot of the preliminary sanding of the old paint, then drove it to the body shop sitting on a plastic crate with no door panels, when he got there he went ahead and unbolted both the doors as well as the hood so basically all they had to do was mask off a few things and start spraying. Then when they finished he came into the shop, bolted the doors back in, bolted up the hood, drove home and reinstalled all the trim and the seats and carpet and so forth. most of the money isn't materials or the cost of painting itself, its the cost of the time it takes to prep it and finish it up. Most places could mask off and spray a vehicle in a day or two, but it could take a week or more to get all the stuff off and back on.
I want to paint mine a dark royal blue, almost like the new "true blue" color.