Boiling Water Is Another Option
Some people simply use boiling water to fix dents. This method is best suited if the depression is present on a plastic bumper or even just another plastic part of your vehicle. With this approach, you need to boil a potâs worth of water before pouring it over the dented area. Then, reach behind the affected area and push against the indentation. If it’s a bumper dent you’re dealing with, you may have to remove the bumper to reach it. After you’ve done this, pour a pot of cold water over the area where the dent initially existed.
There’s Many Ways A Car May Become Dented
When most people think of car dents, they imagine them resulting from incidents with other cars. For example, it might happen if someone parks too close to you and clumsily knocks off your car with their door while exiting their vehicle. While this isn’t too uncommon, there are many other potential sources of car dents worth considering. One major cause of these indentations is bad weather. This could come in the form of a large hailstorm or harsh windstorm damage. Vehicles can incur damage from falling rocks or other road debris.
The truth is, none of us are safe from the risk of getting dents in our cars. While many of us will take sufficient precautions to keep our beloved rides safe, there’s no way to guarantee they’ll stay dent-free. For this reason, even if your vehicle hasn’t experienced a dent yet, it’s great to know how you could fix one by yourself should an issue arise. This knowledge alone could save you time and money and keep your stress levels down.
By Using A Hair Dryer And Compressed Air Method
The combination of hair dryer and compressed air is the easy, quick, effortless and most popular method to pop out dents.
Hairdryer expand the plastic by heating the car dent direct with it,
And the compressed air contracts the plastic by spraying due to its coldness will help pop the dent out.
The first thing that needs to be done is turn the hairdryer to its hottest setting and direct the air toward the dent to expand the cars plastic.;
When the car plastic is hot to the touch, immediately take the can of compressed air, flip it upside down, and spray the same area you just heated before.
Since the rapid changes in the temperature allow the dent to pop out on its own, making this process easy and quick.
If you dont get satisfied with the plunger method, try to remove dents from car plastic .
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Should I Repair A Dent Myself
The decision to repair a dent yourself depends on a combination of things:
- Extent of damage small dings should be easy enough to fix yourself but more extensive damage will probably need the help of an expert.
- Budget rates for bodywork specialists greatly vary, in fact, you could pay between £36 to £200 an hour for their help.
- Confidence even the simplest repair job can seem out of the question if youre not comfortable making repairs yourself, in which case you should arrange for professional help.
- Time sourcing all the tools and materials can take a while, especially if you shop around for the best deal. Thats before youve even started to master the techniques for a high-quality repair job.
If youre unsure about how to do the job yourself, an RAC approved garage will be happy to help restore your car where possible.
Other Things That Cause Small Dents In Vehicles
There are many other things that can cause small dents in your vehicle. Things like falling objects, like an apple falling from a tree or something dropped from a roof can cause dents on your vehicles horizontal body panes. Even incidents as mundane as a shopping cart in a mall parking lot bumping into your vehicle or a child riding their bike into your vehicle can cause small dents.
Regardless of what causes the dent in your vehicle, so long as the dent is not too severe, the paint is intact, and the area behind the body panel can be accessed by the PDR technician, the small dents in your vehicle can be repaired by the paintless dent repair process.
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Hot Glue Wooden Dowels And Screws Pulling Method
This method takes some engineering on your part but it is a good way to ensure that you dont chip the paint of your vehicle. You will use your own pulling force to release the dent over several areas where the dent has formed. Simply, place screws on the end of small wooden dowels. This will act as a handle for you to pull on. You will use the hot glue to affix the dowels to the dent. Apply the dowels in evenly spaced areas over the dent. When the glue has dried, begin pulling on the dowels to pop the dent out of your vehicle. You will be able to get maximum force over the dent and pull it out over several areas of impact. This will leave your car or truck cover without any paint chips as it is a safe way to pull out a dent.
Use A Bathroom Plunger
An everyday household plunger can remove small or medium-sized car dents and is most effective with wider and shallower indentations than the typical one-inch dings. In many cases, the plunger suction cup can pull indented sheet metal back into place.
Make sure to use a cup plunger designed for sinks and not the flange type used on toilets. Just pour some water on both the plunger suction cup and over the dented area. Place the plunger over the dent and gently push and pull until the dent pops out.
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The Hair Dryer Method
This method is not as easy as it sounds and will require the use of dry ice which is not exactly a household item even though some people will refer to it as such. The idea here is to use a little bit of science to get the dent out of your vehicle. You hold a hair dryer 6 inches away from the dent in your car, remember this has to be a fairly shallow dent, and heat it up. Then, covering the dent with a piece of aluminum foil, use some safety gloves to handle a piece of dry ice and rub the dry ice across the aluminum foil.;
If you don’t have access to dry ice, there’s also the possibility then you can use some compressed air which is also very cold when it comes out. The science behind this is that the change in temperature, from the heat of the hair dryer to the rapid cooling of the dry ice or compressed air will cause the dent to pop out. This should take only a moment to happen. If it doesn’t happen very quickly, it’s not going to work.
How To Apply The Final Coat
For the final coat, you can take it to your local body repair shop for a professional paint or do it yourself. You’re going to have to get exactly your color in a spray can. If you have a spray gun run by a compressor, even better.
- Once again mask everything off and apply three or four even coats over the area over the period of a day. Let it dry hard overnight.
- Wrap the 800 grit wet sandpaper around the sanding block and slowly start sanding smooth. Take it right into the edge of the good coat on your car to make sure the new paint blends in. Always keep the area wet while sanding.
- Then once you’re okay with it being smooth it’s going to look very dull. Take to the area with a rag and the cutting polish compound. Once again keep the area wet and rub it for about ten minutes.
- Lastly take a fresh dry rag and polish it normally with car polish. If it still looks dull then go back to polishing it with the cutting compound and try the final polish until it shines like the rest of the good paint.
This article is accurate and true to the best of the authors knowledge. Content is for informational or entertainment purposes only and does not substitute for personal counsel or professional advice in business, financial, legal, or technical matters.
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Use Hot Glue Wooden Dowels & Screws
When you attempt to take out dents yourself, you always put the risk that you might further damage your car, whether you make the dent worse or chip the paint. A safe way of trying to take out big dents on your car is by using several wooden dowels, a few screws, and a hot glue gun.
Simply place two nails into each side of the dowel and put the hot glue on the bottom. Place the dowels glue-side down in areas around the dent, repeat as many times as needed to cover the area, let them dry, and pull each one out until the dent is gone.
Place and pull the same dowels in several different places across the dent until most of it comes out. If you’re going to try this method, make sure that you have enough glue and some patience. Use rubbing alcohol or heat to detach the glue from the car.
Hot Water And A Plunger
You may be able to remove a small or shallow dent from a plastic car part with a pot of boiling water and a plunger. To try this method, pour the boiling water either from a pot or a kettle directly onto the dent. Take your plunger and plunge it into the dent, pulling out quickly. You may need to do this several times in order for it to work.
You can also do this on a shallow dent without any water, or with cold or room-temperature water. The water helps the plunger get a good seal, allowing you to pull out the dent quickly. But with minor dents, even the cold water may not be necessary.
Check out the following video to see this method in action:
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Dealing With Minor Dents And Scratches
No matter how careful you are, minor dents, scratches and chips can still happen. It could be an accidental scrape, another driver opening their door into your car or, especially in winter, grit on the road flying up and causing damage. While theres plenty of seasonal motoring advice available, scratches, dents and chips can affect your vehicle all year round. All sorts of remedies exist, and our guide includes some of the easiest and most effective ways to deal with such problems.
Remove minor scratches
A scratch is a scratch, right? Well, not necessarily. There are a few different types of scratches your car can experience, with different ways to best fix them.
Swirls
Hand washing your car can result in paint swirls on the top coat, caused by bits of grit getting stuck in the cloth used for cleaning. Clearly, its best to avoid this occurring in the first place, by using high quality microfibre cloths and a grit guard in the bottom of your bucket. This should stop the cloth or sponge scratching the paintwork and picking up dirt in the water in the first place.
If its too late though, run your fingernail over the damaged area and if you struggle to feel it you can apply scratch remover to smooth it out. Add a small amount of the liquid to a cloth and rub gently in circular motions over the swirl to smooth it out. Rubbing too hard can cause more damage, evident if the cloth turns the colour of your car, which is a sign that youre taking some of the paint off.
How To Fix A Large Dent In A Car Door
If there is one thing that makes any car owner View with frustration Its having a dent on the side of the car door. If you are having the same frustration right now then youre not alone, Many dents are caused by accidental Smashes and crashes.
Maybe you had a car passenger who slammed your car door Into those pesky parking pollards or, even worse, another persons car door. And maybe it wasnt intentional, but yet you swallow your emotions to save face for your passenger. But deep down you fume with anger, and it doesnt stop there, the inconvenience continues when you are in need to find an inexpensive quote from body shops to fix the large dent on your door.
The worst thing about it doesnt stop there, Now you have to go out of pocket. The worst thing about all is that you have to pay expensive auto collision body shop bills out of your own pocket or, you have to go through your insurance company, which causes your insurance rate to get higher premiums for the following years.
Now you could use this DIY dent repairing from home to remove those;large car door dents;with no experience.
With these few helpful home methods that have been used for years. So these before you take it into the auto shop for professional dent removal services and, spending your hard-earned money.
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Collisions Can Be The Cause Of Small Dents
Collisions are often the cause of small dents. We all know that accidents happen and that vehicles bump into each other sometimes. If you see a small dent on your bumper, door, fender, or another body panel on your vehicle, it could have been caused by another vehicle bumping into it.
Look closely at your dent. If you can see another colour of paint in your dent, there is a good chance that another vehicle has bumped into yours. Although this may be alarming, the other vehicles paint will normally rub off and so long as your paint has not cracked and the impact scratching is not too severe, these dents can be repaired with paintless dent repair.
Hair Dryer And Compressed Air Expansion And Contraction Method
This method uses an infusion of hot air and cold air. As these two come together, they allow a dent to pop out on its own. The hair dryer makes the plastic expand in the dent and the compressed air is cold and makes the plastic contract, essentially popping the dent out. Heat the dented area of your vehicle with a hair dryer at the highest setting possible. Get it as hot as possible and then use a can of compressed air to blow on the dent. The cold air will contract the plastic and allow the dent to pop out on its own.
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Repairing A Car Dent With A Hair Dryer And Dry Ice
Repairing a car dent with a hairdryer and ice is remarkably effective. For this method you’ll need a hair dryer, a pair of solid rubber gloves, some dry ice, and tinfoil.
- Have ready with you a piece of tinfoil larger, than the dent, that you can put over the dent as soon as you’ve stopped heating it. This will make sure that the heat you apply remains on the dent.
- Then use the dryer, on high heat, about seven inches or so back from the dent for about three minutes. Be careful with the heat as you can blister your paint.
- Apply the tinfoil.
- Next put your pair of rubber gloves on and pick up a handful of dry ice cubes and start rubbing them on the tinfoil.
After a few minutes, the dent should pop out. The reason for this is that you’ve slightly expanded the metal with the heat and then the coldness of the ice reverses this process and contracts the metal.
You may have to repeat this process two to three times before the dent pops out.
You can also buy dry ice in a can with compressed air. This is quicker and more effective than ice cubes.
Sand To Shape And Glaze
- Sand the filler to match the contours of the car body using 80- and 180-grit sandpaper.
- Then feather the edges of the filler right up to the painted edge.
- Next, apply finishing glaze to the entire patch and then sand with 180-grit and then 320-grit sandpaper.
- Use DIY car paint sealant to keep the patch looking fresh.
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How To Fix A Dent
How big is the dent? Is it neat or very crumpled? Is there damage to the paintwork?
If its a fairly clean or simple dent, you might be able to fix it. If theres damage to the paintwork, you might need to get the professionals involved.
Or if the damage isn’t too deep into the paint, try the fix for scratches suggested above.
Small Dents Caused By Sports Accidents
Another common cause of dents in vehicles is sporting accidents. Weve all seen it happen in the movies before, a kid hits a baseball out of the park, someones aim is off with a golf shot, and some kind of sports ball lands on a vehicle and damages it. In the spring and summer during sports season, this happens quite often.
Things like basketballs, baseballs, soccer balls, golf balls, and more can leave dents in your vehicle when they fly off course. Luckily, the dents caused by these sporting accidents are often minor and shallow round dents that can be repaired by the paintless dent repair process.
When sporting balls come into contact with your vehicle, they often just create a round rent with no impact scratching. In some extreme cases, golf balls can leave more severe dents, but it is unlikely. If your vehicles factory paint is not showing any signs of cracking at the area behind the dent can be accessed by a PDR technician, these small dents can often be removed, and your vehicle will look good as new!
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