thoughts on paint?

[Sylorna]

Hey guys
When I first bought my Mazda 3 in 2011 I was living up North in Sudbury. Due to the large amount of sand on their roads and the long commute I was making to North Bay I ended up with some massive scratching in the sill under the back window on my hatch. I took the car to my parents favouite body work guy and told him the goal was to prevent rusting. He just did the sill, and the colour wasn't matched perfectly, but I figured whatever, at least no rust.
Well....this spring welcomed me with bubbling topcoat and some surface rust. His work is falling apart. I've gotten 2 quotes, one for $650, and one for $675+tax and car rental. Unfortunately I don't have this kind of money, so I'm considering trying to do it myself, with the idea that even if it's a bit messy or the paint doesn't match perfectly at least then I am preventing more rust.
I've done some looking on the forum at paint matching services and it looks like Paint Circuit and carquest do half decent jobs. Would you bypass all that and get a kit like this one?

https://www.robertspaintcare.com/can...d=55&mod=MAZDA 3&y=2011&c=41611

Are there any videos/how to sites that are particularly good?

Should I keep on looking for quotes, or do those sound reasonable?

Any other advice? I'm pretty confident that with good instruction I can pull this off to a moderate job.

[SonicBoy]

That's not a bad kit as it includes the etching primer. A bit pricey but includes everything you need paint wise.

There are lots of videos up on YouTube.

Rust is like cancer in that it seems to always come back and is very hard to stop. You need to apply a rust converter for your repair to last longer otherwise you will be doing this repair again down the road short of replacing the metal.

Whether or not you look for a better price at another shop or try to do it yourself will all depend on your skill level. The paint match from Roberts is really good as all repairs can never be a 100% match especially with tri-coats (Crystal White Pearl or Soul Red Crystal).

[Sylorna]

Thanks! I'll look at the components of the kit more closely and educate myself on what they do.
Are you talking about a rust inhibitor? My partner wanted to put some on before painting, which sounded like a good plan to me.
Fortunately I'm dealing with silver and not a tri-coat. Also, I'll be replacing paint that already doesn't match, so no loss there.

[SonicBoy]

if "rust inhibitor" converts the existing rust by a catalyst reaction to a paintable surface then yes.

Surface rust can always be sanded, treated, primed and painted. You really need to understand if the rust is coming from the underside of the panel and rusting through to the paintable surface. That's why some of these repairs require new sheet metal to be worked into the area.