Paint and Body work questions

I’ve been noticing a lot of paint chipping on the front of the truck and right before the rear tire on drive and passenger side, i thought it was dirt but it’s just destroyed paint and scuffs. What should I do about that? and with the front bumper the clips aren’t clipping and it’s separated from next piece (seen in picture) Should I replace it or is it fixable?

 

Is that supposed to be white underneath the paint on the front bumper? wondering if its a used bumper that got resprayed. The front plastic piece on mine is a bit loose as well and has worn through the paint but its just a small black mark where the bumper plastic is showing through. As for the rear fender/bedside, there should be factory PPF there you could pull off and have redone. Also there's supposed to be a chunky plastic piece at the very bottom on the leading edge.

 

Yes, the white is under the paint. There’s multiple spots on the the front where it’s chipping showing white. And there’s no ppf on either side. I did buy it used not from a dealer. I do go offroading a lot and i don’t have steps or sliders to protect it. I could replace the whole front bumper but then i might as well go metal or pre runner front end.

 

this is repairable, but the lower/smaller bumper cover moving around, as it does, is what's causing the damage. so any repair/replacement is most likely going to have the same end result later on. my vote here is either offroad bumper, or light touchup with a paint pen so the white doesn't stand out so much.

the gap is definitely repairable, but if the front bumper is moving that much, it's quite likely that it's going to happen again.

this is the result of not running mud flaps-- the tire's kicking up crud, and basically sand blasting the paint with it. not easy to repair, and again, any repair is going to result in a similar damage later on unless actions are taken to either protect the repair or block the crud coming off the tires.

 

Well I’ll be buying some flaps now lol. I’m not sure if the clips are broken behind it because it doesn’t clip in at all anymore. I got some touch up paint from ScratchesHappen and the paint just disappeared lol I’ll try a paint marker instead. How do i fix the damage from the rock and mud etc? or is it a lost cause?

 

Im planning on doing different wheels and tires and had not considered this impact. Ill be doing ppf on that spot for sure now

 

As far as the pitting on the front of the back wheel flares goes (assuming there's a rough texture and you can feel pitting into the plastic and it's not spray from silt or concrete), that's also happened on my truck (albeit it looks slightly different on unpainted black flares vs painted ones), even with mud flaps and stock tires there was still a lot of debris and stuff being kicked up to the back by the front wheels. Adding sliders on seems to have greatly reduced the pitting now since the sliders catch most stuff off the road that the mud flaps don't.

 

the 'sand blasting' damage is mostly a lost cause. it would take some significant work by a body guy to sand down, smooth out, and repaint. it's really not something that a non-experienced person can do well enough to not be noticeable.

the bumper sag, it likely needs a new clip panel that installs behind the bumper edge, which would require bumper removal. but the big thing with this and the front cover is that it's likely from some sort of impact damage. you said you offroad a lot-- it's entirely possible that the damage was caused by an off-camber offroad section. which, if it is from that, it's likely to happen again, so a metal bumper might be a better long term option given your vehicle usage.

 

Someone had fixed the front bumper before and painted that lower piece poorly. That part is fairly cheap and easy to replace. There is a plastic absorber behind it, so you can’t pop it out from behind. I

I am wondering if the bed is something that can be detailed away. That is a really weird place to have that many paint chips. Have you tried polishing compound, or better yet get a professional detail company to take a look at it.

 

Honestly for the sandblasting, id try dr colorchip. I really love the product for stuff like that. The other option is to hit it with some black wax. It gets in the small pits and will help disguise it. Id bet that would work pretty well.

 

Finally a body/paint topic that didn't involve some dolt saying "What about PDR?"

 

Im going to sand it down and just repaint it, and then ppf it afterwards its not that big of a deal but i nitpick everything on the truck. And i am going to go down the route of just getting a metal bumper, i off road almost daily so im not suprised about the damage or anything. Maybe ill lay off the trails for a little lol

 

why would someone suggest PDR on paint chips?

 

Have you seen some of the shit people suggest PDR for on TW body/paint posts?

 

lol, some people expect PDR to be able to fix everything. including this.

 

I think a lot of people here have heard of PDR and just blurt it out because they have no idea WTF they are talking about. Most body/paint posts I see are typically 80% dumb shit replies, and 20% people who have a fucking clue.