Considering a re-spray on my 91 Roadster (BRG). It has a few scratches here and there (none inflicted by my good self - obviously driven through a forest in Japan ... do they have trees in abundance ...) - y'know those light scratches and door ding paint chips courtesy of loony shoppers, and rather than go through the pains of buffing and colour matching I thought I might just go for a full re-spray. That, and I am considering a rear spoiler, so the colour match wouldn't be the best on 9 year old paint anyway.

Anyone ever re-sprayed their baby (hard-top and all) - complications, warnings, what about that lovely chipping protection on the lower panels - will that be gone when sprayed over ? Advice appreciated. Outline costs if any. Am I mad - or should I just try and repair the scratches ?? (4/00)

When my white car came over it had a really poorly repaired rear wheel arch which I had sorted out. Speaking to the bloke who did the work, I asked about a full respray as the original paint was really faded/stained and needed a t-cut or two. He said he'd be able to sort that out with a polish and you really can't see the difference now, between the panel that has had a re-spray, and the re-polished bits.

The point is that a proper bodyshop will be able to sort out most of the problems and match your spoiler without resorting to a full respray which would be around £900 with a hardtop. The chip protection is also very difficult to match, mine is slightly wrong but I gave up after taking it back and having it re-done and it was still wrong ! Thankfully it's only on one side for the bit between wheel arch and door. The rest of the paintwork looks new now. Dentmaster will do shopping dents for 75 quid a panel. (4/00)