need help on paint job

[kapoki]

ok, my previous thread was about the car wash ****-up... now i've gone out to get estimates for repairs.. there is one deep stratch on the front side door- def needs to be sanded and painted.. the cargo door has a light stratch- can be buffed out.. the thing is that... i have custom-painted pinstriping on my car. i'm scared that if i give the place the OK to repaint that door, it wouldn't come out the same anymore and they do have a guy who would re-pinstripe my car (just on that door).. should i go for it? someone told me I should just ask them to apply a coat of clearcoat and wax it once in a while to prevent rust instead of having it repainted because the factory paint job is too beautiful to screw up.

[mcgusto82]

it depends on how deep the scratch is. it it's not to the metal, a clear coat would help (blend it in). if it's to the metal, then it would still show the metal.

[kapoki]

it is deep... i'm only worried abt the new paint blending in with the current paint

[Digger]

I had a bumper fixed. A good paint guy can match it perfectly.

[ToolGuy]

The paint matching these days is really pretty good, I would not worry about that... Unlike years ago. The thing you may notice though is what is called orange peal... After the body shop sprays the door you may see on the finish what looks like an orange peal. To get rid of this is to wet sand and buff the paint to a more glossy finish like the factory finish. The shop tries to keep some orange peal because the factory finish does not look like glass say for example on a custom show car that has been wet sanded many times to get rid of this peal look. Hard to say what you should do without actually seeing the damage. If it is down to the metal I would get paint on it soon though. The only alternative I see is try to have the pin stripe guy touch up the scratch only with the same paint as the door is currently painted and than buff it out to blend it in...