What You Should Know About Paintless Dent Repair

If you're a car lover, the word dent may be enough to send a shiver down your spine. Auto body dents and dings are unsightly, and drivers dread spending substantial time and money to get them repaired. Fortunately, paintless dent repair, or PDR, provides an alternative solution that improves on traditional dent repair techniques in many ways. Here's what you should know about paintless dent repair.

How Does PDR Work?

Paintless dent repair gets its name from the fact that no additional paint is applied during the process. Instead of patching the dent with body filler and painting over it, technicians perform PDR by manually bending the dented panel back into the correct position. This is done using bent metal rods and body picks.

Pressure must be applied carefully with the rods for paintless dent repair to be successful. A rod is inserted behind the panel through an access point such as a window opening. The technician pushes the dent outward repeatedly to smooth out the damage. Body picks are used intermittently on the exterior of the panel to correct any spots that are pushed out too far.

What Are the Best Use Cases for PDR?

Ideally, every dent could be repaired with this quick and simple technique, but this is not the case. Dents that are too large will often resist attempts to smooth them out manually. Additionally, the specific shape and features of the dent can rule out PDR in some cases. The origin of the damage can give you an idea of whether paintless dent repair is likely to be possible.

Hail damage restoration is one excellent use case for paintless dent repair because the dents left by hailstones are relatively smooth, round, and uniform. Impacts from stones and other small objects are often fixable with PDR, as are minor fender benders and parking lot collisions. On the other hand, dents with creases or deep, puncture-like impressions may be impossible to restore.

Does PDR Work for All Vehicles?

Different types of vehicles can sustain wildly different damage under identical accident conditions. Naturally, the size and shape of the vehicle play a factor, and so does the material that the damaged part of the vehicle is made of. 

Materials like fiberglass, plastic, and certain other composites are not good candidates for paintless dent repair. PDR makes use of a property of metal panels called metal memory. Metal memory describes the tendency of metal to return to its original shape once the resistance of smoothing out the dent has been overcome. Fortunately, a majority of modern vehicles are made with metal body panels that can be repaired with PDR.

What Are the Advantages of PDR?

Now that you know how paintless dent repair works and whether your vehicle is a good candidate, you may be asking why you would choose paintless dent repair. The first benefit to consider is that material costs are lower for PDR since there is no need for primer, paint, a sander, and body filler. This translates to savings for you. You will also enjoy spending less time at the auto shop since the PDR process is simple and quick.

You will thank yourself for choosing paintless dent repair when it's time to sell or trade in your vehicle. Repairing dents with body filler is a modification that reduces the vehicle's value. Conversely, paintless dent repair adds no material and leaves no trace of damage when done correctly, preserving the value of the vehicle.

Paintless dent repair is the go-to option for minor to moderate auto body dents and dings. Visit Coats Auto Body & Paint so our PDR pros can help you enjoy a dent-free vehicle again!