I'm looking for a body and paint shop that can handle truly custom work (not just custom parts) -- one with a mature clientele and design aesthetic.

I'm willing to drive 100 miles outside of DC for the right place. I just wish I could find one!

This is one of those times I wish I lived in SoCal.

Thanks for any help, fellas.

 

....

 

Try Gary best Kustumz,, he's pretty good with custom paint and body work

 

Good note, thanks.

 

What type of custom work are you looking to have done?

 

Respray, shaving, and fender widening.

All to my fiberglass bodied Esprit.

 

hands down in nova

D & V Autobody. They do all the collision work for Ferrari/lambo/maserati of Washington out in Sterling. It's hands down the best body shop in the area especially for exotics. They are also car guys so they know this is your baby and treat it as such. They have repainted whole cars for me, tinted lights, shaved emblems,painted wheels, etc. You name it they can do it. Perfection comes at a price though, so if you want it done right and don't mind the cost D&V is the ticket. A good contact there is Ron and the phone number is
23550 Overland Drive
Sterling, VA 20166
(703) 661-8545

 

D&V was the first place I turned, but they didn't want to mess with it. Thanks though.

 

D&V and Europros in Gaithersburg both came as a good word from what I've heard from folks..

 

Bubba's East Coast Customs just did a friends Viper and it was top notch. His shop has a show on TV as well, might get a featured episode.... They're in Fairfax I believe.

 

Very interesting! ...but I think they're way too focused on American Iron. Good to keep in mind, though.

Thanks.

 

A lot of it depends on precisely what you want and what your expectation level for absolute perfection is, specifically as to shaping. To make a body panel like that perfect-perfect you're talking make a mold using cfd = computational fluid dynamics or something of the sort, followed by robotic carve-out of foam prototype, followed by laying up mold on top of that prototype to be used for lay-up production of the panel itself. And panel could be fiberglass, carbon fiber or any of the umpteen hi-tech plastics on the market now but some of those would require making mold for injection type of casting process.... = mo money, if the real deal pre-pregnated type of carbon you need to make an autoclave mold to with stand the pressure and thermals of autoclave... and then of course go find an autoclave to use at a place like Aberdeen proving grounds = good luck. You are talking many many 10s of thousands of dollars maybe six figures per panel. Obviously unless you are using the mold over and over in mfg. process to make $ (i.e. a co. like Vorsteiner making a part over and over and over, or you're involved in a relatively hi-level of pro motorsports like F1 and Indy type monocoques are made this way, you aren't going to be doing that.

Next best, make a mold using a mock-up material to make a mold. Some people use molding clays, some use bondo type products, shavable spray foams etc., and choice material may depend on whether part being made is going to be fused onto existing body work or a complete panel itself. Then same deal make a mold from mock up for lay-up with whatever choice material is, including lower tech wet lay-up carbon. This is not going to produce a perfect perfect piece, as in oem level of tolerances. However this is how most mid-lower level competition car panels are made and even some small scale production oem car mfg. parts I know are made this way, and it is good enough but still you're talking a lot of $$ and unless it makes economic sense or you're going to make $$ with the molds it prob. isn't worth it. I.e. I know a guy who had a Carrera GT that he tracked a lot, and he had a habit of putting the front and rear bumper panels into stationary things. After two sets of OEM bumper panel replacements at abt. $25-30k per panel he was told by someone who knew what they were talking about (Stealth Composites) - and I think correctly so - "I can make you a set of molds cheaper than you can buy a set of OEM bumper panels and then you can crash them up all you want and we can just churn a new set next time you crash at a very reasonable price. And he did that and the pieces made were very very nice, but def. not OEM perfect. And in fact when he went to sell the car it did for sure impact the value, not just b/c it was proof positive the car had hit something at some point regardless of how minor, but because you could tell when really scrutinizing close up that they weren't OEM bumper panels, for one they had some "snake skin" like texture from the carbon fabric which was probably more a result of the mfg. process than the quality of the mold itself but still. And you could have taken that texture away by smoothing with bondo type products but by that point your adding weight and possible issues with bonding of the filler material down the road etc. so what’s the point.

Next best, and this is really only practical for a relatively simple shaped peice, is to just do fiberglass / hi tech plastic layup by hand, carefully, methodically with that artful eye I think you said you were looking for in a shop. You see people doing this on lower level competition cars all the time, drag cars, roar racing cars, custom boat pieces etc. but it isn't going to be perfect and more often than not "looks like someone made that". But I've still seen a lot of that kind of stuff where it is obvious someone made it relatively crudely but it looks good and suits the intended purpose.

So like I said it all depends on what level you're looking for and your expectation as to perfection. Most body type businesses making good money doing more routine things (like D&V and EuroPros... and I know both those sets of guys but don't want to speak for them) don't want to open that can of worms as to expectation level of customer on "custom panel work" and almost for sure can make more money doing the kinds of things they do routinely all day long.

Painting, "shaving" = no problem. Custom shaping / panel mfg. if you want level 1 above empty your trust fund and call someone like McLaren Group in Woking UK, to spend a good chunk of money for like level 2 above I can refer you to people who can do that - be prepared to go to FL. Level 3 above I can refer you to people who can do that too and do it very very well but it is going to be a "hand made" panel(s) or flare or whatever it is.

 

Fantastic post! Really, seriously, thank you.... you encapsulated everything I've been thinking/worrying about since I conceived this idea a few years ago.

I see SO much (what I call) "body shop car design" that is awful, which is why this project has been sputtering for so long.

At the same, time I think what I want to accomplish is relatively simple (not easy) so I'm confident that the right person with the right passion could get it done and looking good for a responsible amount of money.

Not to mention.. it’s also a unique opportunity for a shop to cut up such a rare car.

So to answer your question: my expectation is that the modification to the panel in question would be made directly on one side of the car and then, depending on how difficult it was, replicated on the other using a mold of the first or again by hand.


That said… this is not a race car, it's a driver, so it needs to look factory and be durable.

Again, this is a fiberglass bodied car, made with old school technology, painted by hand, and assembled by questionably sober Englishmen in the early 90s. It’s not a pressed aluminum panel, built and painted by robots in Germany …which I think makes things easier, in large part due to the fact that the custom pieces and the OEM pieces will be the same material (I've NEVER seen fiberglass mate to metal nicely).

So yeah, I'd love to hear you suggestions. In fact, I'm dying to hear them.

Thanks a million.

 

holy crap Cliffey that's a whole semester's worth of fab class notes in one post ... plus defending a PhD at the same time buddy

This guy just wants a spray and shave, unlike the race car stuff you and I talk about lol...I think any decent body shop can handle that, now what I would recommend is going to a shop that specializes in glass fibre bodied cars such as Corvette specialties...

 

I will try to respond more later.... and show some good examples of the type 2 hand-made-mold option....but off the bat I can tell you mold from first side hand-lay-up to replicate other side wont work unless its a perfectly symmetrical piece in the first place b/c other side will be a mirror image of first.