Some donut ran in to my smart a couple of weeks ago and besides manking up my rear bumper on the left side he also dented my Tridion Cell slightly. (Right behind the drivers door)
Seems as though NO ONE - even Ray Catena know the approach when this damage occurs with respect to fixing it.
The body shop (a friend of mine runs it and he has repaired two of my cars previously) isn't sure of what to do with the Tridion and none of the people he called including (again) Ray Catena could offer any help.
I did learn through this process that there is some sort of 'organization' that houses a database of information about repairing ALL cars.... they won't have anything in the DB for a couple of weeks.
The dilemma - I told the body shop that the Tridion was powder coated.... the issue here is the process used when powder coating - clearly they can't strip the ENTIRE car to bake the cell again.
The body shop know they can fix the dent - the cell is high strength steel and it isn't creased or crimped, just slightly dented - so this he says is a non issue.
Has anyone had a damaged cell fixed and did they simply have the cell painted?
Please let me know - any information is appreciated.
..I believe a guy in So Africa/Australia? had a tree fall on his car creating a cell damage that the insurance Co will not wanted to be repaired...if it's not creased/wrinkled/crimped as stated then a good prep/prime/paint job will suffice....my 1c
Comparing a forfour with a fortwo might be somewhat different.
The skin of the tridion is nothing different than your regular car. The high-strength components are inside, not what is on the surface. The visible parts of the cell are repaired like any other car after a non-structural hit.
Hi Ian,
I had a lady run into the side of me a few months ago when driving my smart roadster, and she went right down the side of the car, the trid was damaged by being dented and scraped and I also had a bit of panel damage, the insurance approved repairers fixed it with no problems, they pulled out the dents on the trid and smoothed it out, then spray painted the trid as well as the panels, if you look in the right place on these smart forums, you can get paint codes for the tridion, so it is no problem to spray paint, and I am particularly fussy and the car looks brilliant and you can't tell it had been damaged.
Pictures are better than words. The first 2 are the damaged car, then the third is the fixed car, good as new.
Comparing a forfour with a fortwo might be somewhat different.
The skin of the tridion is nothing different than your regular car. The high-strength components are inside, not what is on the surface. The visible parts of the cell are repaired like any other car after a non-structural hit.
I think "im"s concern is with the finish, not the actual repairing of the metal. He referred to the 'powder-coated' finish and that you can't strip the entire car to refinish the tridion.
There was a thread on here (just thought of it...not looked yet) about the panoramic roof panel separating from the tridion cell on some vehicles. To do this repair properly, again "I think" they had to 'strip' the entire car, re-powder-coat the tridion and then reassemble. Of course this was done under smart warranty and not at the expense of an insurance company.
I'm lucky enough to have spent the last 40 years in the collision repair business. I can say that doing a paint repair on the silver structural areas is not a big deal.It would be carried out the same way any other routine spot repair would be done.There is no need to use extreme measures like stripping down the entire chassis or removing the existing finish.The standard repair process,using urethane products,is compatible with the original finish.
I'm lucky enough to have spent the last 40 years in the collision repair business. I can say that doing a paint repair on the silver structural areas is not a big deal.It would be carried out the same way any other routine spot repair would be done.There is no need to use extreme measures like stripping down the entire chassis or removing the existing finish.The standard repair process,using urethane products,is compatible with the original finish.
Regards, Jim R.
I agree, and that is what I was trying to get across, there is no need to strip down the trid and powdercoat the whole car, just spray paint the affected area, and the finish is compatible with the powdercoating, as powdercoat is just powdered paint anyway.
ellis
After giving this a little thought and looking closely at mine,I have doubts as to whether the silver finish is powdercoated anyway. Please correct me if I am wrong. It resembles the sprayed on waterborne base/clear system used in most every OEM paint process.I have never seen a powdercoat clearcoat finish. hmmmm
After giving this a little thought and looking closely at mine,I have doubts as to whether the silver finish is powdercoated anyway. Please correct me if I am wrong. It resembles the sprayed on waterborne base/clear system used in most every OEM paint process.I have never seen a powdercoat clearcoat finish. hmmmm
Jim R.
The metal parts are powder coated the plastic body panels on the metallic colors are sprayed with a water based paint according to smart.
karl
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