How Many of You?

[Liam40]

Hi Everyone,

How many of you have bought a new, nearly new or used car and have worried about it getting scratched, chipped or dented by other car users when they walk past your car or opening their car doors?

I’m hoping to get a new car, well, a used new car to me, and am worried this is going to happen as soon as I get it! Just wondered what you all thought about this.

Liam.

[iantt]

You need to get used to it. Not one of my cars have managed to stay dent or scratch free, regardless of how careful I am and where I park it. I'm quite fussy with my car and like it to look clean and dent free. Doesn't stop some idiot damaging it. Someone's scratched and damaged my front bumper not long ago. It irritates me every time I look at it. Don't want a chipsaway style repair done so I've ordered a new ford prepainted bumper. Not cheap but at least I know it's the right colour match.

[drsdriver]

Totally agree with iantt, you will always get some numpty mainly I find young women & old people that don’t care about their car that will not give a damm about your car. 

Literally this week parked in a shopping car park that had about 9 shops including Aldi so quite a decent size car park. I parked away from  the shops as far as I could, but the car park was quite full. Space next to me was empty but it was a small space so I was confident no one would park next to me !

I was gone 5 minutes if that, returned to my car and blow me some scruffy old Peugeot had reversed into the space and was inches from my car but parallel with it. There wasn’t enough space to even walk between the cars let alone open my damm car door . Fearing the worst that it had been scrapped down the whole length I looked the best I could but couldn’t see any damage. There certainly wouldn’t have been any passengers in the Peugeot as the cars were to close to open their door. 

Eventually after waiting about 5 minuets for them to return, I went through my passenger side door let handbrake & out of gear and had to push my car out of its parking spot , its sooo damm heavy . 

Sooo ***** annoying. Next day my chest was killing me, pulled some muscles straining myself whilst pushing it. 

So answer to your question, yes it may get damaged, scratched and door dinged. It doesn’t matter how careful you are, other people are selfish, jealous, ignorant & totally incompetent in parking their cars ! 

[isetta]

my wife worked for a number of years at a large supermarket and parked in the main car park where the customers park so there is a lot of coming and going from other cars all day. She had her Ford Focus for 9 years. There were at least 100 marks from car doors being opened against it. There was only one which was an actual dent, but there were at least 100 little scuffs on the paint. It was a silver car and luckily they did not show up all that badly after using Tcut  to get the various other colours of paint off the scuffs which I would do periodically.

On my previous Fiesta I had a small dent in the bonnet one day, it looked to me like a lorry with high doors had parked beside it and then someone had opened the lorry door and dug the bottom corner of it in my bonnet about half way up it about a foot from the side. Red paint left on my black bonnet around the dent

[TomsFocus]

If it's already used, you'll see plenty of scratches, swirls and dings when the showroom shine wears off anyway...  

Cars are impossible to keep perfect.  Bush scuffs and stone chips are totally unavoidable.  If you regularly park on the roadside you will eventually lose a mirror or worse.  If you park under trees the bird crap and sap ruins the paint.  If you park in car parks people will ding the doors or scratch handbags and trolleys against it.  Plus at some point you'll inevitable kerb an alloy...

I hate detailing cars as a perfectionist because I always find new marks, it's less stress just to leave it dirty and go for the rally look instead!   

[drsdriver]

Total moorons . They do say supermarket car parks are the worst place to park. 

[alexp999]

26 minutes ago, TomsFocus said:

I hate detailing cars as a perfectionist because I always find new marks, it's less stress just to leave it dirty and go for the rally look instead!   

That's what I do, lol.

[Albert27]

Mine is covered in scratches and I couldn't care less.  Gets a wash once a year by myself in March and continuously rinsed through winter by aiming for potholes with clear looking puddles.......   But then again, I'm running it into the ground so no reason to care...........

[Ratters]

All you can do is be picky where you park it .... Away from the shop entrance is an obvious one as most people like to park right outside 

I also try to park on an end & tuck over as far as I can. You will never stop it completely though as long as it's in a public area!! The first time I took the Escort out, to a car meet, after a 6 year rebuild, someone walked past it with a zip/bag & put a scratch on the rear quarter..... Luckily it pretty much polished out & isn't really noticeable now.

[Stoney871]

Always park at the far end of carparks and you'll generally find more spaces due to natural laziness of others.
Accidental scratches don't bother me too much, it's malicious damage that annoys me.
Drunks and idiots that don't respect property or feel you deserve it because you try to keep a decent car on the road are the real problem here.

Sent from my SM-G930F using Tapatalk

[Micro]

Bought my new (used) car, and asked the garage to touch up a few little blemishes on the outside. 4 years later, those blemishes are starting to reappear (as if the paint is wearing off), and i have numerous stone chips, scuffs (country lanes and brambles), and paint that has rubbed off (tailgate handle).

You can only see these at close up, and only when the car is exceptionally clean. I've touched up the tailgate and the bottom rear of both rear passenger door sills (stone chips) to prevent rust, and a few stone chips, but otherwise leave it as-is. My car is a tool to get me from A-B - as much as I add mods to make my journeys more comfortable - and enjoy my car - it is just that, and stone chips, and contact with brambles, touching kerbs/potholes will happen with the amount of miles I do.

[Liam40]

Thank you everyone for your replies!

A lot of truth in what you all say. I suppose you can’t do anything about it, well what doesn’t involve a friendly chat with the perpetrator with my mate ‘Buster’ 😉

[GaryPL]

Unfortunately the world is full of selfish and arrogant people. Nothing we can do about it.

On the off chance that I find a dent I am reasonably confident was caused by a vehicle that's still next to my car, I will make sure I get revenge 10x over. Is this right? Probably not, but it makes me feel a lot better. A few scratches and a nail near the sidewall of the tyre and they're in trouble.

You can always spend a bomb on a ceramic paint protection coating. Whilst it won't eliminate everything, it'll certainly be pretty hard wearing. Something like Crystal Serum will even resist a moderate key scratch... But on a Fiesta of more than about 6 months old, you're looking at around 7-800 quid as it takes a lot of prep work, including probably a day or just over with a machine polisher.

I had this done on my Fiesta and wish I hadn't given the experiences I had with it and Ford, but I am pretty sure someone's driving around happily never having to wash their car and not knowing why.  Assuming it hasn't broken down on them and Ford again proven incompetent in fixing it!