This car was delivered to Classic Auto Body and Collision in Ramona, CA on May 27, 2020.  I got it back yesterday on my birthday, November 17th, 2021, almost 18 months later.  Carlos the owner told me it was probably the last 2002 he would work on.  He was painted numerous cars for Bill Holmes at Bavarian Rennsport, he painted my Mintgrun 75, but will now concentrate on insurance work which is significantly more profitable.  Originally, we negotiated $4800 for a complete paint job with some minor rust repair (there was rust in the front valance under the battery and under the rear side windows).  This was a little more than the Mintgrun paint job, but that one didn't include the trunk, interior, underside or engine bay.

When we started, there was another BMW 2002 in front of me in the queue and that delayed the body work on my car.  It was a Tii and required tons of metal work which took months to complete.  Eventually that Tii's owner decided to paint his car elsewhere, so I was next, right?  Wrong, the Pandemic was in full tilt and my car sat languishing under a tarp in the yard.  Even after the Covid-19 case load numbers improved, Carlos couldn't find anyone that wanted to sand primer and weld metal for a living, thanks Biden!

When things returned to some semblance of business as usual, my car moved from the yard to the garage and the body work started.  Once the car was is primer, it was time to finalize on the color.  This was the most difficult part of the process, what color should I pick now that a full paint job provided the freedom to change to any color I wanted.  Part of the decision was based on the interior color, (Tobacco), which isn't as universal as Black, but not as limiting as Marine Blue.  So I had Carlos spray out samples in the following colors (E21 Reseda Green, E21 Opal Green Metallic, Baikal, Florida, Turkis, Derby and Nevada)  The first five paint codes were available in PPG, Derby and Nevada however, were only available in Glasurit.  Of course the $4800 price was for PPG paint, so sourcing Nevada and Derby, if picked, was going to be on my dime.  It was close, but I decided to go with the original color of the car, Nevada, to give myself some wiggle room on a later decision for going the restored original look, or full resto-mod.  Of course, Glasurit had just introduced some new water-based paint lines (Glasurit 90 Line) that were less expensive and offered the Derby paint code, but not Nevada.  Nevada was only offered in their most expensive paint (Glasurit 22 Line) which ran about $1500 with Activator and Reducer for the 1.5 Gallons Carlos needed to paint the entire car.  Remember the guy that had the Tii in front of my car?  Apparently, when he pulled his car from the shop, he left a gallon of 3M Dynapro undercoating that Carlos used on my car as a credit (+ $200) for not having to buy the PPG paint.  So total cost was $4800 (Less $200 + $100 Undercoating) + $1500 in Glasurit paint, activator and reducer, so $6000 all in.

I must admit, the Glasurit 22 Line looks great, like it was dipped.  The paint has that slight hint of olive undertone that really sold me on this color.  I am really happy with the result.  It took more time than I ever imagined, but I am smitten to have it back in the garage and excited to get farther down the road to restoration.

Mark92131