Has anyone here had experience in Changing car colour ?

Spannerhead

Spannerhead

Spannerhead

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Weird question for you lot. I am ( probably) buying a car from a relative ( little old friendly lady , low mileage blah blah blah …. Nah just kidding she was a nut job )


I love the car because I know the person would have kept good care of it and it’s got whole service history

…… the only problem is that it comes in a dull black colour.

I was thinking of getting the colour changed. I always wanted a aggressive red colour or a calm blue colour.

I did a search online to see if this can be done but I keep getting conflicting information ( especially about the cost )

I was wondering if anyone here has had any experience in changing their car colour , as in was it worth it , was it successful? Did you have any problems later if the colour faded or something ?
 
Easiest way is to get it wrapped, make sure you find somewhere decent to do it. There will be cowboys that'll offer to do it cheap (like around a grand) but they'll use poor quality wrap and you might end up with scratches on the underlying paint when you remove it.

What size of car is it? I'd think you'd be looking at at least £2000 for a small car to be wrapped properly. With a wrap you don't have to declare it to the DVLA as it's classed as non permanent i believe but if you take care of it it should last quite a long time, like 6-8 years.

You could get it actually resprayed but that's a huge job and will cost much much more like 3-5k sort of money.
 
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It’s a fiesta zeetc. holy moly £2000? just for wrapping :eek:

maybe give it a miss. Unless buying red emulsion paint would work. Nah sod that wont even joke about that

for wrapping assume you have to go to some facility for that
 
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There'll be lots of places that offer wrapping fairly locally to you i'd have though, you'll need to take it to them and leave it for a few days as you need to take stuff like bumpers and mirrors off the car, it's not a 20minute process.

People usually on respray cars that are quite valuable as its simply not worth it on older or cheaper cars.

I've got a classic Mini that needs fully painting at some point after i restore it and for a full respray that's actually going to be worthwhile i think i'll be lucky to see change from £3500 as its a huge amount of work.

Just buy one in the colour you want and save several thousand as you'll never get that money back.
 
Spannerhead said:
…… the only problem is that it comes in a dull black colour.
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Black generally isn't a dull colour - just needs some effort polishing and waxing with a suitable product, as black can be one of the best looking cars in terms of shine and reflections - just needs some care and attention

Spannerhead said:
It’s a fiesta zetec. holy moly £2000? just for wrapping :eek:
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Unfortunately it's just the cost of labour. Even "just" wrapping or plasti-dip (a peelable paint that can be removed at a later date), requires a lot of time to be done right. Done "wrong" and the finish and look otherwise can be terrible.

Spannerhead said:
Ok thankyou. I’ll supposed It’s either black or buy another car. Dream over
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It's a car that sounds like it's got a good history, so probably be a fool to pass over it and risk buying something else, just to have a different colour.

Spannerhead said:
I was thinking of getting the colour changed. I always wanted a aggressive red colour or a calm blue colour.
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If you want to change the appearance, what about some racing stripes or other graphics?

You could even get individual parts painted or wrapped that would be cheaper, and e.g. go for the look from the Fiesta Black Edition (with red roof and mirrors)
www.independent.co.uk

Ford Fiesta Black Edition, motoring review: Available in any colour

www.independent.co.uk www.independent.co.uk

You can get coloured mirror caps and the like cheaply from ebay.
 
Armageus said:
Black generally isn't a dull colour - just needs some effort polishing and waxing with a suitable product, as black can be one of the best looking cars in terms of shine and reflections - just needs some care and attention


Unfortunately it's just the cost of labour. Even "just" wrapping or plasti-dip (a peelable paint that can be removed at a later date), requires a lot of time to be done right. Done "wrong" and the finish and look otherwise can be terrible.


It's a car that sounds like it's got a good history, so probably be a fool to pass over it and risk buying something else, just to have a different colour.


If you want to change the appearance, what about some racing stripes or other graphics?

You could even get individual parts painted or wrapped that would be cheaper, and e.g. go for the look from the Fiesta Black Edition (with red roof and mirrors)
www.independent.co.uk

Ford Fiesta Black Edition, motoring review: Available in any colour

www.independent.co.uk www.independent.co.uk

You can get coloured mirror caps and the like cheaply from ebay.
Click to expand...

The reason for the colour change was because I have noticed that like 80% of cars today that I see are either black or white. No really go to a car show room and count the black and white cars and compare the number to cars with other colours.

I do generally think that car manufacturers design their cars on a computer …… using an old black and white tv.

Racing stripes are for teenage yobbos or people having a midlife crises . My neighbour has these on his car and his 55 . He brought the car when his hair started to deplete. :D

Gonna go with the ‘dull’ black look Sticking with the only modification of having cobwebs in the wing mirrors.
 
Probably just needs polishing. Unless you just mean the colour is dull.

Either way it's not worth it.
 
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Spannerhead said:
It’s a fiesta zeetc. holy moly £2000? just for wrapping :eek:

maybe give it a miss. Unless buying red emulsion paint would work. Nah sod that wont even joke about that

for wrapping assume you have to go to some facility for that
Click to expand...
you laugh i once had a unit next to a paint shop, saturday afternoon guy realises he hasnt ordered the paint for a car hes prepping customer to pick up monday.....sends his lad out to buy 5 litres gloss white.
customer picks said car up excellent. till 2 days later it rains and its water based apparently all the street had a white stream:)
 
sovietspybob said:
Easiest way is to get it wrapped, make sure you find somewhere decent to do it. There will be cowboys that'll offer to do it cheap (like around a grand) but they'll use poor quality wrap and you might end up with scratches on the underlying paint when you remove it.

What size of car is it? I'd think you'd be looking at at least £2000 for a small car to be wrapped properly. With a wrap you don't have to declare it to the DVLA as it's classed as non permanent i believe but if you take care of it it should last quite a long time, like 6-8 years.

You could get it actually resprayed but that's a huge job and will cost much much more like 3-5k sort of money.
Click to expand...

you will have to declare it as you've changed its colour

so if you drive a car that's manufactured in red and you get it repainted / wrapped or whatever in Green for example, imagine an ANPR camera pinging it as "red" but it isn't ?






It’s perfectly legal to change the colour of your car, but you will need to notify both the DVLA and your insurer. Read on for a guide on having your colour changed, and how to correctly report it.
 
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Yaayuh! said:
@Acme

...

:D
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Cheeky b... :p

Generally you won't have issues as long as you get a decent job done.

If it's a desirable model it may devalue it.

A wrap would work but don't get a cheap one because some wrappers cut on the paint and damage it.

Also be wary that peeling off the wrap always runs the risk of damaging the paint.
 
Spannerhead said:
I was wondering if anyone here has had any experience in changing their car colour , as in was it worth it , was it successful? Did you have any problems later if the colour faded or something ?
Click to expand...

Loads of times, AMA
Pay-n-Spray-III-Portland.jpg
 
ShiWarrior said:
It’s perfectly legal to change the colour of your car, but you will need to notify both the DVLA and your insurer. Read on for a guide on having your colour changed, and how to correctly report it.
Click to expand...

Yeah 100% need to inform insurer, DVLA it depends a bit on what you have done but no reason really not to anyway and can bite you in the rear if you don't even in cases where ostensibly you can get away without doing so.

EDIT: I've not tried changing the colours of a vehicle but surprisingly maybe so far I've not had any changes to the cost of my insurance due to declaring cosmetic modifications, at least where they've been to the same or higher spec as the OEMs parts.
 
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That's interesting about DVLA, i was told a definitive 'we don't care' from the DVLA regards having a car wrapped as you're not actually changing the colour of the car itself, just temporarily putting a big sticker over it essentially like you would with advertising decals so it wouldn't be correct to change the log book colour as you can just peel it off and then it wouldn't be correct again?
 
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sovietspybob said:
That's interesting about DVLA, i was told a definitive 'we don't care' from the DVLA regards having a car wrapped as you're not actually changing the colour of the car itself, just putting a big sticker over it essentially like you would with advertising decals so it wouldn't be correct to change the log book colour as you can just peel it off and then it wouldn't be correct again?
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It's changed in recent years from what I can gather, but can't find an official site with the commonly quoted wording
 
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