Honest Maaco Opinions

[Lance Racing]

The best way to get a good paintjob from Maaco is as follows:

- Prep the car yourself. Do all the sanding, leveling, etc yourself. They will basically spray the car without doing any prep at all, so do it yourself, and do it PROPERLY. A good paint job is 90% prep.

- Remove all of the trim yourself. Accept the fact that they will do a poor quality masking job, so remove all of the trim pieces, and mask it off yourself.

- Meet the guy who will actually spray your car. Be nice to him. Get his attention and tell him you'll pay him a li'l extra, give him a case of beer, whatever, if he'll take a little extra time on your car.

- Pray.

Maaco CAN do a good job. But it will be MUCH better if you take the time to prepare the car yourself, and if you can get the painter to make a little effort.

Otherwise, yes, you will have a paintjob that has a million runs in it, with tons of overspray, and plenty of peeling in a year's time. Good luck trying to sell it like that, down the road.

All good points. Ask if they have access to different types of paint. Can you supply the paint? Then you could bring in a good quality PPG paint. We've been taking in the PRO-3 race cars to Macco for paint jobs. We do ask for a good clearcoat which helps. We don't expect the paint to last forever on the race cars because they're just race cars and could easily be crashed and totalled at any race weekend. So we don't want a ton of money tied into a paint job.

You could take the same project to 3 different Maaco shops and get three different end results.

[Rigmaster]

Maaco varies a great deal from shop to shop.

When it comes to painting a car, for the most part, it's sort of "you get what you pay for".

Maaco is famous for their cheap paint jobs- but they're also famous for their "extras" which often border on bait and switch tactics (not just Maaco, but most cheap paint places).

Ask around for some recommendations, maybe find a painter who does work on the side. Don't go with the cheapest paint- but don't go with the most expensive either. If you know what you are doing, you can do some of the prep work yourself- but I wouldn't expect any of the cheap paint shops to do ANY prep work at all if you're just buying their $299 paint special.



Bret.

Well it looks like I won't be using Maaco

[Bill-B]

Maaco is the McDonalds of automotive painters

[AlarmedBread]

Rattle cans > Maaco

[Tavern Gnome]

No. Don't do it. No matter if you prep the car yourself and take everything apart, the fact of the matter is that Maaco uses the absolute bottom of the barrel single stage paint. Its just garbage. You're right across the bridge from me, I can recommend plenty of good alternatives. I've been in the industry for years and I know lots of people who can help you. Give Matt at Premier Collision a call, 253-722-5224, tell him what you're looking for and he'll help you out. PM me if you need anything else, just don't go to Maaco.

Ryan

[trashcop 80s 80s]

I had a maaco car once. The paint was peeling around the rain gutters after a year, they did zero prep work in that area. The paint underneath was smooth and clear coated.

[shiftbmw]

Maaco is fine for what you pay. A good quick fix for a bad looking car(like when the neighbors start yelling at you). Won't last forever but can't really go wrong for that cheap.

[atomic]

The best way to get a good paintjob from Maaco is as follows:

- Prep the car yourself. Do all the sanding, leveling, etc yourself. They will basically spray the car without doing any prep at all, so do it yourself, and do it PROPERLY. A good paint job is 90% prep.

- Remove all of the trim yourself. Accept the fact that they will do a poor quality masking job, so remove all of the trim pieces, and mask it off yourself.

- Meet the guy who will actually spray your car. Be nice to him. Get his attention and tell him you'll pay him a li'l extra, give him a case of beer, whatever, if he'll take a little extra time on your car.

- Pray.

Maaco CAN do a good job. But it will be MUCH better if you take the time to prepare the car yourself, and if you can get the painter to make a little effort.

Otherwise, yes, you will have a paintjob that has a million runs in it, with tons of overspray, and plenty of peeling in a year's time. Good luck trying to sell it like that, down the road.

This is so very true !!!! The only thing I would have to add is that the paint they use is a cheap ass paint and probably will not hold up more than a few years at best..... But 90% of the paint job is the prep put into the car to get it ready for paint.... And once it is done you will have a better looking job if you colorsand it once the paint has cured some.....

[JasonC]

I had bought a 1970 Dart that was painted by Maaco. The paint laid flat with no runs and the metalic was even through out the paint. But there was hardly any gloss to it and the paint was a bit on the thin side.

[MR 325]

You might have to do your own color sanding and polishing after the paint job to get it looking less orangepeely.

[Low Level E30]

The best way to get a good paintjob from Maaco is as follows:

- Prep the car yourself. Do all the sanding, leveling, etc yourself. They will basically spray the car without doing any prep at all, so do it yourself, and do it PROPERLY. A good paint job is 90% prep.

- Remove all of the trim yourself. Accept the fact that they will do a poor quality masking job, so remove all of the trim pieces, and mask it off yourself.

- Meet the guy who will actually spray your car. Be nice to him. Get his attention and tell him you'll pay him a li'l extra, give him a case of beer, whatever, if he'll take a little extra time on your car.

- Pray.

Maaco CAN do a good job. But it will be MUCH better if you take the time to prepare the car yourself, and if you can get the painter to make a little effort.

Otherwise, yes, you will have a paintjob that has a million runs in it, with tons of overspray, and plenty of peeling in a year's time. Good luck trying to sell it like that, down the road.

Most of the time, to get a decent paint job with minimal orange peel, you will still end up paying over $2000.

my buddy got his e30 fully painted for 800 i think. it looks good too.

[Mike325]

Most of the time, to get a decent paint job with minimal orange peel, you will still end up paying over $2000.

[MR 325]

The worst thing about places like that is the paint job really doesn't last as long as something of better quality would. If you're wanting something to look good for a couple years, just do it.