Just like New: 5 Hacks for Removing Dents and Scratches from Your Car


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Owning a vehicle can come with a wide variety of costs ranging from maintenance to unexpected damage to your car. When it comes to unexpected damage, you may not always have the money to make the repair at your local body shop. If this is the case, you may be looking at ways to damage yourself. While major body damage will require a professional such as dodge repair shop Holzhauer Auto & Motorsports Group, minor dents and scratches can be touched up or repaired by yourself. Today, we are going to look at 5 hacks for removing dents and scratches from your car.

Toothpaste

According to WHO, vehicle wrecks cost over $500 billion USD annually, which shines a bit of light on how quickly small repair costs can add up. While insurance can usually cover many of the major repairs that you will receive in an accident, sometimes your vehicle will only suffer a small scratch which would not be worth the hassle of going through insurance. For these small scratches, you can easily fix or lessen the effect of the scratch by using a single item found in every household – toothpaste. Toothpaste can be applied to a scratch in your car’s paint to help remove the scratch.

To remove a scratch on your car using toothpaste, you will need toothpaste and a half damp/half dry cloth. Simply clean the area where your scratch is to ensure you get a good look at what you are working with. Dab a little bit of toothpaste onto the damp side of the cloth and rub in into the scratch. At this time, you should notice the scratch start to disappear. Buff out the remaining toothpaste using the dry side of the cloth and you are all done.

car-wash

Shoe Polish

Another common fix for small scratches is using shoe polish. Shoe polish is used similarly in fashion to toothpaste when it comes to the technique, however, there are a few things that you need to remember when using it. With toothpaste, you can easily fill in a scratch on any color paint as it is pretty neutral. For shoe polish, you are always going to want to find a polish that is darker than your vehicle’s paint color. This process is a little more involved, but the results can be rewarding.

To use shoe polish to remove scratches from your car, you are going to need shoe polish (a little darker than your car’s color), some wet sanding sandpaper (high grit), and a lint-free towel. With the surface thoroughly cleaned, wet the surface with clean water and use the sandpaper to sand the scratch down to the same level as the surrounding paint. Make sure that you do not sand too hard as this can cause damage to the paint. Once the area is roughed up a bit, lightly buff some shoe polish into the area and watch the scratch disappear.

Nail Polish

If neither of the first two hacks seems like your cup of tea, or you would like to fill in a deeper scratch, touch up rock chips, or need to fill in a chip in your paint, you can always use nail polish. Yes, we said it, nail polish. Many car parts stores carry touch up paint that can be purchased in the same paint code as your vehicle, however, you can get away with something very similar at no cost to you. Simply compare your car’s paint color to your or a loved one’s nail polish for a close match and use it as a touch-up paint.

What you are going to want to do is take the nail polish and using the included nail brush on the lid, dab a small pit of the polish into the scratch or rock chip. The nail polish acts similar to paint and can be a great way to restore a rock chip ridden hood or bumper. For even better looks, you can come back and lightly wet sand the spots to blend the polish in with the paint.

Heat & Extreme Cold

You may have seen the next step on a viral video as it has become one of the most common approaches to removing a dent in your car’s body panel. Extreme heat and cold changes can cause the metal to expand and contract, making dents in metal return back to their original form. One of the most common tricks is using a heat gun and a keyboard air duster. Simply heat up the dent and surrounding area with the heat gun to let the metal expand. Then, turn the keyboard duster upside down and spray it onto the area. Turning the air duster upside down releases an ice-cold spray that will instantly freeze the metal. This rapid change in temperatures has been proven to remove dents in various panels.

Plunger

Last but not least, one of the most interesting ways that people have removed dents from vehicles is with a household bathroom plunger. The plunger is placed in the center of the dent and suctioned to the metal. The plunger is then pulled to help pull the metal back into place. This method doesn’t work for all types of dents, but it has been proven to work in many metal dents where a plunger could fit into the center of the dent.

Now that we have looked at 5 different ways that you can get your car looking better after it receives a dent or scratch, it’s time for you to try these hacks on your vehicle. When trying these hacks, it is best to try them on an inconspicuous spot on your vehicle to ensure that the method you choose will not cause further damage. This will also allow you to practice on the best technique that will make your car look its best. We hope that this list has given you the confidence to fix your car and hopefully save you a few dollars!

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