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So what is it with idiots in parking lots and doors?

5K views 29 replies 23 participants last post by  Talladega900 
#1 ·
So we've had our 9-7X Aero less than 6 months and this past Monday my wife, twins and I ran into a local store. I usually park it at the farthest reaches of a parking lot, but with a pair of 10 month old twins, we didn't want to subject them to the high winds that day.

The lot was relatively empty, and we found a slot close to the front door with the driver's side adjacent to a curb.

We're in there perhaps an hour and return to the car. To my wife's horror she finds not a door "ding" on the passenger side, but a CREASE and a nice vertical white paint smear on the metalic black of the 9-7X!!!

What the hell???

Car had long since gone, no note, nothing. No one respects other people's property anymore...

Goes in for repairs next week. Wish me luck in matching the paint...
 
#5 ·
I do have mild dreams of taking the imaginary baseball bat and giving it a good swing at a mellon-head sometimes. (Heh, heh!) But then reality smacks me in the back of the head instead...
 
#4 · (Edited)
Yeah, I'd thought of that and plan on going back to check their tapes. Hopefully we can get the guy, but I doubt it seriously: Whatever hit us was on the far side of the car relative to the store and any security cameras that may have seen anything.

But who knows? I may get lucky.
 
#6 · (Edited)
I hate people who just take off like nothing happened. One of my old cars was shaved and had a custom paint job, and 3 days before I was to enter a big show, a dude with a ghetto lean was trying to back into a spot next to my car with his 80s Chrysler Landyacht. He ended up hitting my car, cracking and flaking the paint and putting a nice crease in quarter panel. I found his car later, parked next to (my car was four door... with pointy back doors) and conveniently had to get in my rear passenger door. His car got a nice return wack. I then moved my car. Eye for an eye. ugh.
 
#7 ·
Sorry to hear about the door on your 9-7 :(

I had a similar thing happen.

It was within 2 weeks of buying my Aero... Parked at work at the faaaaaaaar end of the work parking lot during a freak spring storm (patriots day storm if anyone in NE remembers). Anyways, 60-70mph winds took a shopping cart that some asshat woman left in the parking lot and it sailed across the lot and left a foot long crease in my door.

The store I worked for denied responsibility and wouldn't pay for it (Best Buy). Also, it was not on Camera (so they say), and the store manager had no intention of helping me since the repair would've come off the store's bottom line. Thankfully when my wheel fell off last winter the door crease got fixed at the same time.
 
#13 ·
how is that the ladies fault?

today i was parked in a spot at the post office, some bitch in a jeep liberty parked into my spot, and when i opened my door it accidentally hit her car leaving a noticable ding. whoops, i guess i better be more careful next time!

good luck with the paint matching, it seems like it shouldnt be too hard as its almost new right?
 
#8 ·
i had a weird one...
Went down to the university of Illinois for my sister's annual halloween party... I wasn't too excited about parking on the street overnight, but went ahead with it anyway. the next morning.. errr afternoon.. comes around and I go out to my car, what do I find? someone with a converse, probably about a size 10-12 kicked my rear quarter panel. it was a clear shoe print in the light dust/dirt that was on the paint. I was beyond pissed. The crazy thing is, she lives in a neighborhood with families and older people... not exactly the typical college town drunk area.


good luck with the 9-7.
 
#9 ·
Goes in for repairs next week. Wish me luck in matching the paint...
Matching the paint depends on where the crease is and who's doing the spraying. If they spray the whole door with color, the likelihood of matching is less. If they blend the color, chances are greater. If the crease is near the edge of the door, then blending into the next panel might be necessary. This of course would require clearing the creased door and the panel they are blending into. The painter at the last body shop I worked was anal about color matching. Let's hope whomever you take it to is the same way.
 
#12 · (Edited)
Heya DM! Well, the good news as far as paint shops is I'm taking it to the shop that did both C900's for me. Of course in those cases, there was no "matching" issues at all. The entire cars were sprayed.

He's also done some repair work to the GTO's roof and did a great job with a very similar color to the 9-7X's: "Phantom Black Metalic" on the Poncho looks to be about the same as "Carbon Flash Metalic" on the Trollblazer.

And I trust Paul, the paint shop owner. He's always stood behind his work and if there are any issues after the fact, he fixes it.
 
#10 ·
Few years ago I was with my fam in mountains. We parked in a lot for like 4hrs and left to ski.
we come back and see a ding on a door. But there was also a note under the wiper with an apology and number to contact about it. That guy paid about 50 more just for our hassle fixing it.


But it was in Austria or Slovakia, I dont remember :)
europe>usa
 
#11 ·
I have about a dozen little dings in my doors on my ng900 vert. There have been times where I would be SITTING IN MY CAR and someone would wack my car with their door and then make eye contact after. Then they would just... walk away... I got out one time and threatened to call the police after taking pictures and they paid up. But it wont get rid of the other 11.

Good luck with the black matching, thats always a difficult task :)
 
#15 ·
i was sitting in my SE in a parking lot and some middle age guy litterly throws open his door to get his fat ass outta the car. lol, i must looked like hell, too i had just lifted and gone trail running and was covered in sweat and mudd.

i was in the parking lot flippin out on the guy, when my friends pulled in who were meeting me. imagine this guys horror when he is getting flipped out on by a another guy, then 3 20 something guys show up and all pile out of the car to see what i'm going on about.

guy paid up and like a extra $100 to get it fixed.
 
#18 ·
Paintless dent repair. It works trust me :D Unless paint was removed from your door, you should be good. Take a look at what can be done... No worries about paint match and the factory paint is kept. The paint left on your car from the car that hit yours can be buffed


Good luck man, I know how annoying that feels, this same thing happened to me more times than I care to remember. People have no respect for other people's property.
 
#21 ·
I've had paintless dent repair before on my Talladega. This time it was a foot long crease, not just a "door ding". There was no way someone with a paintless dent repair kit was going to fix that.

It went into the body shop the next week and was done within a day. Paint matched just fine, too.
 
#20 ·
Within a week of having my Saab in the US I had TWO dings on my right rear door, up at the top right on the crease. Grocery store parking lots FTL. Like the OP I park as far as I can from other cars or find cars as nice or nicer than mine to park next to. Yesterday when I came out of the grocery store someone in a yellow 08 2.0T vert had parked next to me.

A few years ago I came out of a store to find some woman with her car door right up against the door on my 95 Grand Cherokee, luckily it was on the plastic cladding at the bottom of the door. But that didn't stop me from giving her a ration of shit. She glared at me the whole time I was loading groceries in my car, like I was the inconsiderate shitheel.

When I flew back to Copenhagen after my grandpas funeral in 2006 some guy in a 9-5 had parked so close to me that I couldn't even get in the drivers side of my car. I had to get in the passenger door and climb over the center console. I opened my door about three inches and left him a "present". Mean, I know, but I'd been traveling for 28 hours with a 5 hour layover in Heathrow and was just not in the mood for asshatery.
 
#23 ·
For those people who are completely cluesless I guess we can get back at them some day, and realize they don't know any better.

Last year at SOC in Devens a fellow SAAB'er put a nice door ding in my back pass door and I guess they figured I wouldn't notice. Nice.... I could have hunted them down because the color of the offender was obvious, however I chalked it up to DRUNKENESS, and I know that my Dent Wizard friend wouldn't charge me much. It cost me a 12 pack of Newcastle

Always good to know a good paint shop and PDR facility.
 
#24 ·
I know the feeling of all this all too well. The entire 3 years that I owned my 05 Focus, I wasn't particularly careful about who I parked next to or anything of that sort. Never had a scratch, dent, ding, crease, etc on it anywhere. The paint, though a bit dull from being out in the winter weather, still looked brand new when I sold it to a friend.
My Saab, however, managed to attract 3 key marks on it within a month of having it. Unfortunately, they're all 3 down to the metal and would have to be rebuilt. They're not huge but they stick out rather nicely from about 5 feet away. And a nice blue ding in the driver's side door. And 3 or 4 chips in the hood that have been color keyed but not filled.
Some people are just so jealous of other people's nice things that they have to vandalize them to make themselves feel better. Other's are just plain careless and dumbtarded.
 
#30 ·
The Goat, thankfully, has been generally spared the door dings. (I've jinxed myself, I know)


But the sand-blasting effect on the hood's leading edge is pretty wicked. It will need a respray soon.
 
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