How to waste a can of compressed air on a Jaguar - YouTube

So I tried the old "heat the metal up then cool it down trick", as you see in the video. Didn't work. Maybe the metal didn't get hot enough.

Now I've removed the inner door panel, but its hard to get good leverage to massage the dents out, might just need better tools, any recommendations? Or would a glue puller be able to fix these?

I have a feel a body shop would charge several hundred dollars to do the job.

 

I've been in that same boat, had a dent on my front passenger fender just over the wheel. Can trick didn't work either. I was able to get under there, heat the are with a heat gun and massage the dent out from the inside. I got majority of the dent out, however up close you can still see it; especially the spots where the metal was being pushed from the inside. Not that noticeable from outside, but enough to drive me crazy. My recommendation is save the time and headaches and get it done right, I try and do a lot of things on my cars myself, I've repaired dents previously (diy results vary) but I think I'll leave this to the professionals from now on, especially on the jag.

 

Have you considered using Painless Dent Removal service? Here's one in the SF area:

Dent Expert by SAL - Paintless Dent and Ding repair in San Francisco Peninsula Bay Area

No paint refinish involved so considerably lower cost than bodyshop.

Graham

 

I assumed all bodyshops did it pain(t)less.

Cheers,
Jagosaurus - never been to a body shop. Hopefully never have to go to one.

 

I used a mobile dent remover service to get the dents out of my car when I bought it, using all sorts of strange looking instruments he got rid of dents from the front wings/fenders where people had obviously lent hard when working in the engine bay. He also got rid of all the other little dings around the car, very pleased with the results.

 

Used one of these Paintless dent repairers myself on my A6 some time ago.

Picture this, I can be pretty **** about my car looking good and kept clean, so when a dent appeared on the rear door ( right up near the jinge area on the rear drivers door ) I was pretty annoyed.

Please bear in mind that I hand wash my car so I was looking at this tiny dent all the time. It wasn't so much of a dent actually as it was like a screwdriver trying to poke through, causing a raised bump.

Looking at thie tiny bump as I washed the car just made it look huge and its image / location was burned into my memory.

I actually stood and watched the guy do his thing, with all his little weird tools and ways of working.
Gradually the bump began to disappear, but I thought to myself there'll be something......I'll know!!

Well he carried on for around 30 mins or so, I had a coffee / cig and made a few calls.
He announced he'd finished and I went to inspect.

Absolutely no sign whatsoever to the point I questioned myself / my memory about its exact location.

Superb job and well pleased..........Go PDR if you can.

 

I'm going to have some fun with a $20 POP A DENT glue kit first as I've seen enough Youtube and Amazon reviews to conclude that there's a chance it can work if used correctly. It seems like 90% of the 1 or 2 star reviews on Amazon are from people not using the kit right or using it on un-pullable dents.

Maybe I'll make a vid even.

 

I thought Reverend Sam had a relaxed style of video making but your clip of the 'heat and freeze' today had me in stitches.

Taking a call in the middle of making a video AND getting yourself in the reflection on the the side of the vehicle - now that IS laid back!

Good luck with the POP A DENT kit.

Graham

 

First my disclaimer. I HATE body work. Despise it. Will only do it as a means of last resort.

The "pops a dent" principle is basically a take on a classic body shop tool...

Dent puller bridges. Basically you weld keys or studs to the panel... heat it up a bit, and use a bridge to pull it back as close to flat (but not too far so its a bulge), and finish with a skim coat of filler. If you need more than 1/8" filler you're being lazy and haven't worked the metal enough.

Small dings and hail type dents will not come out with this period. There is just too much metal stretch in too small an area. The way the PDR guys do it is to bring the center back up and then work from the center outwards...

Now my concern with this pops a dent gizmo.

First the metal will never go back to exactly it's original shape. I dont care WHAT they say, you will be able to tell the outline of the dent. Can you get it to 85% there on a large flat panel, absolutely. BUT it's relying on the strength of the adhesive. Metal doesn't just "spring" back into shape... it bends slowly. This thing can only pull with as much force as the yeild strength of the glue. So.... rather than just cranking down until the glue fails and it "pops" you would be MUCH better off working the panel slowly. Heat is your friend. heat the edges while pulling the center. Go slow. dont expect a baseball sized dent to come out in a magical pop....

Take care,

George

 

When it sounds too good to be true it is. The paint less repair of dents takes talent and knowhow that comes in doing it more often than once. I enjoyed watching that video but expected him to blister the paint off the car. Do you believe everything you see on YouTube?

 

I'll raise a fact about Jaguar's outer panels being of a particular bake hardened steel, they are a bear to remove dents. I'd skip messing further because of possible damage to the paint and find a seasoned PDR guy. You may find it might need more work after that, i.e. filler and paint.

 

Well I feel that my video has a certain Je ne sais quoi

Gus: There are several tests on Youtube of that technique, I'd say half of which work, half of which don't. I figured those were reasonable odds.

The hardened steel thing makes me think it would be difficult, still a glue puller kit could easily pay for itself if I manage to remove even one dent. With the aggregated advice from Amazon, Youtube and here, I think its worth a shot. I actually think it looks like fun.

I have a date with Sal later today btw, and he'll give me an estimate.

 

I don't know how much it would cost in the US, but the person who did my PDR charged me £100 / $160 to do the whole car - both front wings/fenders, a dent just above the rear bumper on the wing, a dent on the bootlid and a few other little dents around the car. Seemed very reasonable to me and made the car look a whole lot better.

I chatted to him about the "pop a dent" type kits and he said that they rarely worked - fortunately for him otherwise he would be out of work!

 

I have this site on my page for the eager person to try a Paintless Dent Repair

Link: Dent Removal Tools, Paintless Dent Repair Tools - A-1 Tools, Inc.

It has a lot of information along with Training DVD’s I hope this helps

 

My experience after round 1 of PDR with at $20 glue kit.

It works, but i takes several tries and a lot of time - you might be better off paying a PDR guy and the results will surely be better, but you might be able to get to 90% on your own.

0. Do the repair on a 70F+ day, the warmer the metal the more malleable it is. You can potentially overcome this using a heat gun, hair dryer or whatever else.
1. Clean dent attachment points with isopropanol
2. Attach pegs with a thin layer of glue covering their entire base.
3. Wait minimum 8 minutes, the longer you wait the harder the pegs will attach, since the Jag body panels are made out of hardened steel, you might want to wait longer, I did 15 minutes to tackle some of the tougher dents.
4. Pull the dents out using the bracket whilst heating the edges of the dent with a heat gun, make sure to not heat the glue as it will release.
5. Try to get as much tension as possible without popping the bracket off, then let it stand for at least 5 minutes under tension, periodically heat the edges of the dent.
6. Pop off the bracket, if it wont release (the glue has now been on for up to 20 minutes), heat up the glue with a heat gun.
7. Use generous amounts of isopropanol to loosen the glue.

So in general I think the slow method works better than fast pop offs, I've been able to reduce the size of all the dents I've tried this on, so I'll keep working them until they're gone. The Jag is probably not the ideal car for such a kit, but it can work.
There's also a teflon chisel in the kit you can use to hammer dents down or loosen the glue, some say that hammering on the edges of certain types of dents can help, but not sure exactly how that works.

 

Hey Jim--sounds like you are as **** as I am! I have been lucky through sheer diligence of not getting many dings in my cars. But whenever I have gotten the first ding, even if it is miniscule, it ends up looking huge to me and I can never help but noticing it when looking at the car.

The last time this happened was years ago with my wife's then new 2000 TL. My son and his then fiance were visiting and I loaned him the car. He apparently made the mistake of parking in a normal space (versus end-spaces which I seek out) and the car came back with a door ding.

I have had good luck using one of those mobile dent wizard guys (they are even used by the dealers) and have also had good luck with the guys that repair gouged and scratched bumpers.

Doug

 

As written by Jagosaurus The sheet metal on the Jag is made of cold rolled steel. If it was hardened you would not be able to remove a dent it would be to brittle to work it would crack or shatter.

 

Just like I what I said before, you learned by experience

Heat the dent regardless of ambient. Dont exceed 140-150 deg f. Though, not only does the dent get more malleable, so does the paint...

Apply heat under tension - IF you can get to the inside of the panel, even better.

The reason for pressing - tapping on the edge of the dent its to release the newly formed crease. The edges of the dent are the hardest to get to smooth again (its basically the steepest angle in the dent). Do NOT hammer on a dent edge with the chisel. That's for working down "high" spots.... basically sometimes when you dent a car especially on a compound curve, the edge will actually bulge out.

I would release the glue with heat rather than the pop every time.

Take care,

George