SPF for sale $30,000

[TKing]

Vehicle Description.

1996 Superformance Cobra #140. 5000 miles. 2nd owner. New Superformance floor mats, new roof and bows (new style with zip down rear window), new QA1 shocks and coils, new Mocal 16 row engine oil cooler and shroud (car did not have oil cooler when I purchased it), new CV boots, new alternator, voltage regulator, stainless steel roll bar, full bumpers, trunk battery cut off, and radiator bug screen. Approximately $4000 in upgrades installed in last 13 months.

351 SVO Crate engine short block, Edelbrock RPM aluminum heads, Edelbrock Performer RPM intake manifold, billet aluminum pulleys, Holley 750 cfm, Ford E303 cam and roller rockers, MSD 6AL ignition (6000 rpm limiter), Flow Master mufflers, Jordan shifter, Trigo knock off wheels (with hammer and safety wire pliers), Canton oil pan, and Tremec 5 speed.

Vehicle Condition.

Runs great. Everything works and works well. Car checked out and many upgrades performed by Dynamic Motors in October 2003. Roof, roll bar, mats, and other items purchase new 2 months ago. No accidents or door dings. Wheels perfect, no curb rash. Front tires new (800 miles). The tires were replaced to balance wheels.

Faults. Paint is not good enough for me. I’m picky. Small pinhead size blisters are located on top of all 4 fenders. See pictures. Probably 40 to 50 blisters in total. Estimates for show quality repaint in the Louisville area vary from $2500 to $4000. This car is not a junker. Excellent condition and many people have said how great the paint looks! Superformance told me the problem was moisture in paint gun or on car when originally painted.

Other faults. Engine oil cooler not connected to engine. Tonneau cover does not have holes cut for roll bar.

The car was $29,900.00 new. I have receipts for engine, transmission and upgrades totaling an additional $19,000.

[tfarhood]

At $30K it will make someone a great thanksgiving present. It won't last until Christmas. Sounds like a great deal.

[epl]

can you send me some more pics....thaanks.

leeds_eric@yahoo.com

[TKing]

Hi epl:

I'll email pictures to you tonight and try again to upload pictures to this site. I uploaded pictures to the gallery last night, but obviously nothing there this morning.

Tom

[froggyman]

Hi Tom:

Juan here. How come are you selling your car? Are you getting another one?

I will keep my ears open for interested parties.

Juan

[P Martin]

If you could e-mail pics to me that would be great. I have a friend that would be interested

my address is: lmbryd@aol.com

[TKing]

Hi Juan:

I'm selling it because I'm not happy with the paint and I don't know or have not found someone in the Louisville area that I trust to repaint the car. I've taken the car to maybe 8 places and many don't want to deal with individuals (prefer insurance companies), some want a blank check to paint it and some I cannot determine the quality of their work. I also want a car that's more civilized and can be driven more often. If I don't sell it at the current price, I'll keep it and buy another more practicle sports car. Don't tell the wife about my secondary plan.

Good luck with the sale of your car.

Tom

[1Trkpony]

Please send pictures to : *** thanks got them ***

[TKing]

Pictures now posted to my gallery. I sent digital pictures to all that requested them. The pictures were big, so if you had problems let me know and I can downsize.

Tom

[TerrysSPF]

That's too bad about the bubbles in your paint. From what I gathered from your comments a few posts back, it sounds like Superformance was saying it may have been their fault the bubbles happened in the first place (moisture in paint). Normally, a SPF paint job is a thing of beauty - one of the best I've seen. How long ago did they start to appear? Perhaps you could get a SPF dealer to touch up the fenders at a discounted price?
The car is still a beauty, and one heck of a deal for someone @ 30K. Good luck to you.

[TKing]

Terry

The paint blisters did not show up for 6 years! I purchased the car last year and it had less than 1000 miles. It sat most of its life covered in the garage in Chicago. This past summer I drove the car a lot and appartently the summer sun (heating the paint) brought out the blisters! I hoped SPF would be surprised with the paint defect. They were not. The car is chronologically old, but like many SPFs was not outside and driven a lot. SPF did not volunteer to offer help. Just said the car's so old. The problem dosen't often happen, but is not unique to the older cars (or so I'm told). Normally it occurs on darker painted cars. My comments are based on conversations with SPF dealers in Ohio, Virginia and Louisiana.

Tom

[Cobrabill]

Tom-i have #126.The paint on it was junk.You could see scratches(striations almost)in the base coat.And it(the paint) was soft.Almost anything would scratch it.Had i not been infected with the "OH MY GOD-my Cobra is here" disease,i would have told them to stick it and get me another car.I ended up painting it about 4 years ago.It's Guardsman Blue

[Bill Wells]

great value car for the money. surprised it is still for sale.

for what its worth, i have #156, built in 1996 and paint is excellent . looks as good today (minus the normal stone chips) as it did when new, a high quality paint job with no problems. car has seen many rain miles and extended sun outdoor exposure and is normally uncovered in the garage.

good luck on your sale. bill

[DAVID GAGNARD]

Tom;

Having worked in a body shop 13 years and painted a few fiberglass boats/cars I can say I've seen the same thing your describing,but not often.....We had that problem once with a boat and the paint rep came out and looked it over and they helped out with another paint job.
The bubbles could have been the result of a couple of things,moisture in the air at the time they painted the car (I would think SPF would have a heated/humidity controlled booth to paint their cars though),moisture in the air from the air compressor,and/or a mix match of components used in painting the body.......Some paints (PPG comes to mind) use a different reducer/hardner for their primer,sealer,paint,and clear coat,this I do not like.....Too many different chemicals on one vehicle,but they are supposed to be compatible with each other,sometimes under the right conditions they are NOT......DP 40 has to be their worse product,they advertised it that you could prime/seal parts with it and come back up to seven days later,wipe the part down and paint it,yea,it doesn't work that way at all,while painting my own personal truck using DP40 as a sealer and following their directiosn to a T it screwed up my paint job.....The truck was two tone and I put the DP40 on on friday afternoon and saturday morning painted one color and sunday came back to paint the other,when I tried to put the second color on it "burnt" or as some say "crowfeet",rep said I must have done something wrong,would not warraty anything......The shop I worked at was PPG certfied,as were all the emoployes (two day school to learn how to use their products),we had all their air hoses,air filters,and their recommendations on paint guns and they would not warraty anything we did,always had an excuse,in fact we did some research on the matter and found out in five years they had only warrantied one paint job in the whole USA,some warranty........Speaking of PPG paint,in the last five years or so there as is less than five out of about fifty shops in the general area still using PPG,they have all had enough problems with it that they have switched.........

We switched to SIKKENS paint and it was great,they use one thinner and one reducer/hardner for all their products,primer/sealer/paint/clear coat,that way all products are compatible and we never had any trouble with paint jobs or bubbles in paint after that.....My 65 Mustang was painted 10 years ago with SIKKENS and not looking at paint chips or scratches you would think it was painted just last year and it has NEVER been buffed or waxed......

Another thing that causes the bubbles you describe in putting too many coats of paint too fast on a vehicle without letting the coats "flash" between applications,the reducer from the first coat does not have time to evaporate when another coat is applied,trapping it in the paint,later on with enough exposure to the sun as in your car will cause the reducer to evaporate coming thru the existing paint and clear causing bubbles as you describe.....Moisture and temperature determine the flash time of each coat and you have to know what you are doing to prevent this.............

Sorry about your car,but the only way to "fix" it is to strip it down to the fiberglass and start over gagin.........

David

[Dream Master]

I guess I'll have to chime in here guys.
First, let me assure you I am fully qualified as an expert in automotive paints, not just a guy that knows how to use a key board. I was involved in Kick-starting Sikkens/Akzo Nobel (the Worlds largest paint company, yes, bigger that Dupont and PPG, BASF and all the others) to the U S. I did Custom painting and pearls back in the mid 60's when I had to buy the pearl paste pigment from a cosmetic, fingernail polish supplier on 42nd St. in New York, and mix my own pearls, when people didn't know that it could be done. I also was a contributing editor and wrote the paint shop column for Body Shop Business, the leading Collision industry magazine, and I am a certified ICAR instructor.

Keep in mind that all NEW cars only come with a 90 day warranty on their paint! Why? Because the factory cannot control the environment that the vehicle may be subjected to, or the chemicals that it may come in contact with. Acid rain is not the paint or the manufacturer's fault. Some things are not related to application or product (paint) failure, but are a result of the environment. That being said, All fiberglass bodies need much more film thickness of primers and fillers to make the slick for a show car appearance, than a standard OEM car at GM Ford, etc. With additional film thick comes a down side of possibly trapping solvents or moisture, especially. This has really not been a problem with our Superformance cars, and I should know as they call me with any paint problems. Yes there were a few older cars way back 1900 cars ago that may have shown some pinholes or blisters after a few years. The fact that 99 % had no problems, and that 99.9% showed NO problems for years after being put into service is a testiment to the quality of the paints and the application process of our factory. I'll bet SPF's failure rate/warranty paint work is much less that any Average new car dealers. Remember the older Ford, GM, and Chrysler delaminating/peeling factory paint jobs?

David, Unless PPG has changed their system, the two package isocyanate activated DP 40 is an Expoy fill primer that can be used wet-on-wet as am undercoat (not a fill) if desired, but only allows a 12-24 hour window in which to be recoated with a base color or single stage paint. The reason being that the activated DP40 has not attainded a full cure with solvent release and that the window of the crosslinking of the polymer and resin molecules had not been closed or fully linked, letting another application of product to chemically bond with it for adhesion. After this window has closed (time and temp) then you need to rely on a mechanical (sanding) adhesion. With any Epoxy and some paints, there may be a reaction such as burning or lifting when introduced to a thinner (when you sprayed your two tone color). Any time you spray a substrate with a thinned product (paint or primer) the solvent soak right to the bottom then make their way back up to evaporate. This will burn some epoxies and p[aint if it is done while the undercoat is still critical and in it's curing and drying process.

David, hope this helps.

Keep in mind that any paint is porous, just as a windshield is also porous. Moisture can be introduced to a paint job that will cloud and blister any paint. That is why a vinyl bar should never be left on a car especially if it gets wet and the sun comes out and then bakes, and steams the paint until it is ruined.

I think TKing understands that he had a great paint job for 6 years, and is not expecting SPF to warrant it. I believe he is not the original owner anyway. He is giving someone a deal. He knows what he paid for the car and he knows what fun he has had with the car and he knows what it might cost him to have the paint fixed. With all that in mind he says he will take $30K for this car. This is still a great deal, and someone should take advantage of this NOW.

Doug Reed

[Dream Master]

I guess I'll have to chime in here guys.
First, let me assure you I am fully qualified as an expert in automotive paints, not just a guy that knows how to use a key board. I was involved in Kick-starting Sikkens/Akzo Nobel (the Worlds largest paint company, yes, bigger that Dupont and PPG, BASF and all the others) to the U S. I did Custom painting and pearls back in the mid 60's when I had to buy the pearl paste pigment from a cosmetic, fingernail polish supplier on 42nd St. in New York, and mix my own pearls, when people didn't know that it could be done. I also was a contributing editor and wrote the paint shop column for Body Shop Business, the leading Collision industry magazine, and I am a certified ICAR instructor.

Keep in mind that all NEW cars only come with a 90 day warranty on their paint! Why? Because the factory cannot control the environment that the vehicle may be subjected to, or the chemicals that it may come in contact with. Acid rain is not the paint or the manufacturer's fault. Some things are not related to application or product (paint) failure, but are a result of the environment. That being said, All fiberglass bodies need much more film thickness of primers and fillers to make the slick for a show car appearance, than a standard OEM car at GM Ford, etc. With additional film thick comes a down side of possibly trapping solvents or moisture, especially. This has really not been a problem with our Superformance cars, and I should know as they call me with any paint problems. Yes there were a few older cars way back 1900 cars ago that may have shown some pinholes or blisters after a few years. The fact that 99 % had no problems, and that 99.9% showed NO problems for years after being put into service is a testiment to the quality of the paints and the application process of our factory. I'll bet SPF's failure rate/warranty paint work is much less that any Average new car dealers. Remember the older Ford, GM, and Chrysler delaminating/peeling factory paint jobs?

David, Unless PPG has changed their system, the two package isocyanate activated DP 40 is an Expoy fill primer that can be used wet-on-wet as am undercoat (not a fill) if desired, but only allows a 12-24 hour window in which to be recoated with a base color or single stage paint. The reason being that the activated DP40 has not attainded a full cure with solvent release and that the window of the crosslinking of the polymer and resin molecules had not been closed or fully linked, letting another application of product to chemically bond with it for adhesion. After this window has closed (time and temp) then you need to rely on a mechanical (sanding) adhesion. With any Epoxy and some paints, there may be a reaction such as burning or lifting when introduced to a thinner (when you sprayed your two tone color). Any time you spray a substrate with a thinned product (paint or primer) the solvent soak right to the bottom then make their way back up to evaporate. This will burn some epoxies and p[aint if it is done while the undercoat is still critical and in it's curing and drying process.

David, hope this helps.

Keep in mind that any paint is porous, just as a windshield is also porous. Moisture can be introduced to a paint job that will cloud and blister any paint. That is why a vinyl bar should never be left on a car especially if it gets wet and the sun comes out and then bakes, and steams the paint until it is ruined.

I think TKing understands that he had a great paint job for 6 years, and is not expecting SPF to warrant it. I believe he is not the original owner anyway. He is giving someone a deal. He knows what he paid for the car and he knows what fun he has had with the car and he knows what it might cost him to have the paint fixed. With all that in mind he says he will take $30K for this car. This is still a great deal, and someone should take advantage of this NOW.

Doug Reed

[DAVID GAGNARD]

Doug/Tom;

In no way did I want to put any blame on SPF for the paint problems,after six years anything could have caused the problem unrelated to the original paint applied at the factory,just relating some of my past expirences with paint "bubbles"....

Doug,I am ICAR certified and have attended and still attend "paint clinics" put on by the paint maufacters since 1980 to keep up with the current technologies and I agree with everything you have said..... I'm very familar with the two part systems and how they work and how they are supposed to work,but when they were introduced I do not think the people training us new all they should have known about how they work and how they are supposed to work... when the PPG rep came to our shop to introduce us to DP 40 and a few other products,according to him it would change the way we prepped and painted autos,we always followed his (PPG)instructions (printed version he gave us,sorry I do not have it anymore) about using DP40 and it bit us in the ass more than once until we quit using it and a lot of other PPG products.......Seems they were more interested in selling their product at that time than backing it up......I remember we had many many problems with the PPG brand of paint back in the mid eighties and we were not alone,that's when we switched to SIKKENS and most shops in the area did back then..... Not only we found SIKKENS to be a better product but it was quite less expensive to boot.....having said that the local PPG jobber has all but gone out of business here and for a good reason,while other jobbers (SIKKENS/Dupont) are flourishing....

In fact,we were the first shop to use SIKKENS in the area and many paint clinics were put on at our shop since to demonstrate the product and intoduce new products.......

My main problem with PPG besides the cost was the amount of inventory one had to carry with almost every product needing a "different" reducer/thinner/hardner in at least three different temperature ranges....and the lack of tech support and warranty support,I could tell you horror stories about their warranty program,always blaming the shop for any problems...Once it was found out by PPG they had sold some contaminated reducer and they still refused to warranty any of it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Doug, how about "factory fallout" on new vehicles,we did the body and paint warranty for the local Ford dealership for 10 years,have seen tons of it on those big white LTDs/Mercurys.........

David

[TKing]

Doug:

I'm not sure I understood all of your remarks, obviously you know automotive paints. However, from a consumer point of view it doesn't seem logical the paint would fail after 2000 miles. I understand and accept the fact that any paint anywhere subject to the right conditions can fail, but it’s disturbing it could fail in the garage (covered). You're correct, I'm not expecting SPF to cover the cost of repaint. SPF is a business and I accept the fact this situation is just my bad luck. Hopefully some new owner has the talent or knows somebody that has the skill and talent to paint the car at a reasonable price.

In your opinion can this car with be repainted without the problem reappearing again or is it likely this will always be a problem? What would you recommend the body shop do to repaint the car?

Thanks,
Tom

[DAVID GAGNARD]

Tom;

Not wanting to cut in on your question to Doug,but as Doug has mentioned,if a car is covered inproperly it can and will cause more harm than good.............

David

[PatBuckley]

Dream Master -

FYI -

Many car manufacturers warranty their paint for the duration of the basic limited warranty.

Pat Buckley