kaiserbud

DANG.

I know..... I tried adjusting my headlamps """JUST A HAIR""" and got it too far towards the rear. As I extended the headlamp up, I felt a slight hesitation.... DAMMIT..... chipped the paint at the edge of the surround panel.

BUT.... there is a good side..... aside from the 'first' scratch.... after the years of struggling to get this car done, I have also experienced 'life'. Yeah - I am upset, but moved on easily (and I was pleasantly and satisfyingly surprised) .... as I know I (and probably you guys) have/are experiencing things that are really serious (health/family/inances/work).

So.... I got a big smile cause I am getting close with this restoration and today...yes today... I woke up, the family is good, got a bit of change in my pocket, a job, am happy, and VERY close on my restoration.

If this sounds like pumping sunshine, maybe life hasn't hit you with enough challenges yet.

endoman

Well said. When the day is done, it's still just a car

Thanks for your perspective

Rob

temvette72

How would you like this for a "first scratch". Something fell from a shelf in my garage onto my Vette. I shudder to think the damage it could've done to one of my kids! Previous poster is right on: It's only a car!

demonx

I remember about ten years back I had a car resprayed in Black Metallic. First week after the paint job I came back to where it was parked and some bastard had scraped the car the whole length of the front quarter. Damn I was pissed.

So to hear about your scratch - you just helped me feel better about the decision to paint my headlamps in the car! I was starting to feel guilty about being lazy, but I can live with that now. I'll leave them in there when I spray!

Alan 71

Hi KB,
ALMOST EVERYONE who has worked on a car has the scratch or chip story.
Your comments about what to be thankful for are well taken!
Regards,
Alan

oldsarge

I was putting one of my Harleys together a few years back, with a expensive custom paint job. Got it carefully all put back together and was just on the bike backing up in the garage with my feet, and backed into my workbench and hit the rear fender, and got a big chip at the edge. After a few tears and a beer, like you I moved on, Life is good and S__T HAPPENS.

kaiserbud

I agree - Life is good.... but honestly - it took all these life lessons to REALLY appreciate........

I am done for the day - got my top inner skirt seals done (what a chore) , ATF lines hooked up, radiator lines connected, alternator aligned properly, ....

Ya'll have a good one....

1weatherman

Among all you c2 and c3 people, can a c5 guy chime-in here and say "well said"? ;-)

jordan89

Well said. I accidentally cracked the fiberglass of mine when I was removing the front tire and it slipped out of my hands, bounced back up and hit the fender. The good thing is that the crack isn't that big and can be fixed very easily.

weider1717

I have one spot in my 05 paint job that I did moving the hardtop off the car....it's not bad at all but I paid a lot and waited a long time for this guy to even be able to paint it and I did it within 6 months after getting it back from paint! made me sick..know how ya feel.

bobs77vet

with this car of mine i have never painted it......so when the kids scratch it with their bikes, bounce a basketball off it, clean the snow off of it with a snow shovel, open car doors into it, open the door into a tool chest, run the tool dolley in to it, have over spray get on it from painting other things, drive it into the welding table, drive it into the hitch on the suv, i just dont have to yell at any one.....and yes all of those things have happened to my sports cars.....i just keep this one as a drivers and dont sweat it....its actually very liberating

kdf1986

I think there is a difference if you make the damage, or if someone else does. I dropped a screwdriver on my 72 and instead of being upset thought to myself "what if my daughter did this. How upset would I be?". After all, it was just a mistake. Whether I did it or my daughter.

kdf

70BBvert

Sorry to hear about the mishap. I plan to add a chip or scratch on purpose when I finally do get the car back from paint. I figure it will happen anyway, might as well get it over with

Jim

gdh

Great story and very rewarding to read it! this is how I feel about the vette as well. Reminds me of when my daughter was about 4 and she decided to rake the leaves off the roof, you it ripped btn the plastic window and the vinyl roof cover but no one was hurt, the sun rose the next day and the vette still drove exactly the same. I remmber at the time someone said to me that she should be severely punished as it "is a Corvette and a ZR-1" - my rxn was that it is a fun toy and this actually gave me the impedus to drive it through all the unpaved back roads, which I still do to this day many years later.

OURSHARK

Very well said, as you travel through life you realize what is important and what isn't.

dannyman

Sure!
Join in with us as we all say, "Well said! Great outlook! Fantastic perspective!" It's all true, bothersome at best but not life-threatening!

So 1weatherman; you been lurking here for a while now? Thinking of switching over to the dark side? Do it man! Sell that C5 and tear into a body-off C3 and join the ranks! Come on, we need more participants!

Aggitated Monkey

You have a great outlook and that will ripple through your family. Anything can be fixed. I have had many great paint jobs in the past and have had some damage. A damaged paint job is one of the worst I know, however it can be fixed.

I always have nice cars. I always drive them; let my kids drive them (limited) and look at it as just a car. I have had my wife damage my Corvettes from the past and have never gotten up set. Life is too short and you Sir have it figured out.

JDemp

You want a crazy paint chip story.............................

Thursday...thats last Thursday......I'm leaving the paint shop with my freshly painted MoonRoofs in the back seat of my car!!

Oh yea...it's the back seat of my unmarked Police car......so I get just out of the shops driveway and ......some jack@ss in a freshly stolen car is being chased by a patrol unit about a block away.

Being the good guy that I am I join in on the chase, to back the patrol guys up......Well several miles later around the city and we end up off road on a local golf course!

Long story short all that high speed turning and off road bumps, smashed my tops into each other causing several chips in the brand new paint! But on the up side we did get the guy!

They are back at the shop now! True but crazy paint story!

krz-fasc3

Your right, i always say somebody else has it worse then i do. Crazy paint chip story: Adjusted headlight 3:30 am day before Hot Rod Power Tour*, Car freshly painted and i grab microfiber towel to wipe off fingerprints. Did not realize until to late that steel wool had fallen off work bench and got wrapped up in towel. Scratched the heck out of fresh paint.

1weatherman

LOL, funny you should say that! As a matter of fact, I do have a c3 !.....a white 73 convertible, with a 350 and automatic (with a frame-on restoration just about done). But I just like to write some of those c5 comments out there like I did...for among other reasons, my brother (who has a black 69 427 w. side exhaust) "jabbed me" the last time I was over at his house. My black w/ red stripes c5 (that you see in my monikor) was parked in his driveway, while we were working on his 69 that was in his garage. For ease and access (I need a "table top") I laid a cloth across the hood of my c5, and proceeded to put some c3 headlamps parts on it...assembling them. When he saw what I was doing, he said he "...always knew c5's were good for something". LOLOL. Ba*tard! LOL