Does anything work for car scratches?

[NC28]

Bumped my car against my wooden fence as I parked tonight on my driveway. I’ve scraped the bloody side of the car, and don’t fancy paying hundreds to get it sorted, if possible.
The scratch isn’t huge, but it’s noticeable. Doesn’t feel too deep.

Lots of DIY kits available online that match your reg plate to your car colour and promise to fix it.

Anyone have any they can recommend? Happy to pay for a decent one if I know it works.

If you can see the undercoat it s too deep to polish out with T-Cut or similar.
I asked for a quote to repair scratches (no dent) from a mobile scratch repair place about 5 years ago, and it was £400. I live with the scratch!

I can see black/grey under it (the car is white) so I think it might be too deep for me to fix myself.

Contacted a couple of companies for quotes. If you were £400 five years ago, I think. I’ll need to live with the scratch too!

Does your fingernale get caught in the scratch?

If so you can't polish it out.

Is it flat white or metallic?

No it doesn’t. I can feel the texture difference when I run my hand down it, but it’s not like a gouge. I’ll try and attach a photo…

EDIT: image is under review so hopefully will appear soon!

To me that potentially looks like marks from the fence rather than a scratch. It might actually just clean off.

I got a similar mark on my car from contact with another car's wing mirror. After trying various things it was WD40 on a cloth that wiped it straight off.

I’m almost certain it’s my paint that’s come off, though I do have WD40 so I’ll give it a shot later. I did have a look at the fence earlier and none of my paint is on it, so maybe there’s a little chance.

Would love you to be right! 🙏

DH has home repaired a scratch like that, he is not a car mechanic but good at stuff like that. He said pour water over it and if the scratch disappears then it can be polished out. He thinks that one can’t be polished out. If you are very practical and study lots of you tube videos you could do it, that’s what he did but you need quite a bit of patience and as your doing it by hand it takes quite a while. You do lots of layers, he bought everything from Halfords, cost about £50. You need to do over a series of days as layers dry etc. You need dry days unless you have a garage,

Hi OP,

That's a lot less damage than your OP suggests! 🤣🤣🤣

Get some T Cut and a microfiber and polish what you can off by hand. The rest should come out but you'll need a proper machine polisher. I do LOVE my car so I'm pretty good with one! Lol.

So I just got two quotes.

£360 from one company, £375 (plus VAT) from another.

Fuck sake. 😥

Tried the WD40, no difference. I have some T cut as well so that can be my next try later on today.

All those "smart repair" places are just a rip off.

I'm looking at that picture and itching to get my little rotary polisher on it, I just know that 90% of that will come straight off, the rest can be fixed with some touch up spray paint and a tooth pick, them polished off. It would be virtually invisible after.

Take it to a proper bodyshop and ask them to "sand and polish" it. Explain that you just want it hidden a bit, not a full repair, and that you know it won't fix it properly (it WILL get it all but invisible though). They charge about £50 here for that, it's a 10 minute job.

Honestly OP, a proper bodyshop, an independent one, not part of a chain, will get it sorted for you.

That’s exactly who my quotes were from.

I’ll try and get in touch with a bodyshop today, and ask for a sand and polish…£50 seems a lot better than £360+.

Thanks for the reply, I wish I could get you and your polisher round! 😄

Try toothpaste. Google it.

That will T-Cut off

@Chiseltip Local bodyshop, £60 with a 60-80% improvement. Getting some more details from them now. I think you helped save me about £300. Absolute hero.

Will give it a bash with the T cut later on, see what happens. Need to watch a YouTube tutorial on that first…