March 18, 2014 by High Tone Autobody Leave a Comment

Toyota Tundra Door & Bed Repair

High Tone Auto Body can easily and quickly repair light damage to vehicles.

This late-model Toyota Tundra had some damage to the passenger’s side rear door, cab corner, and extensive damage along the bedside. The paint was scraped off as well as extensive denting of the rear door and bed side during the collision. The good part about this damage is that it didn’t do any heavy damage to the frame or bend the overall structure of the truck at all. This type of damage is what you would refer to cosmetic damage because it ruins the overall eye-appeal of the vehicle, but the vehicle will run and drive normally. This is the most common type of auto body repair that an auto body shop will do.

To start the repair we start with the door and cab damage. This repair is a deep scratch that dented in the panel of the door significantly. To fix this damage we need to sand off the paint and extract the dented areas on the door and bed cab with a special tool. This technique helps us get the auto body work done in such a way that there is almost no need of any filler. Sub-standard auto body repair shops would have filled up the dent with filler, which is not a good way to do auto body work. We at High Tone Auto Body make repairs the proper way.

After the body work on the rear door and cab corner is complete, a technician sands down the surface to make it perfectly smooth and ready for a fresh coat of primer. After the primer has dried out, a few coats of matching paint get the looks the vehicle had before the collision. Finally, a clear coat is the final step. This coat will seal the paint and give the vehicle the sparkling looks it had before the collision. We usually do several coats of clear coat until the finish is perfectly smooth and shiny.

While one team was working on the door and cab corner, another technician worked on the removed truck bed. The expert auto body technician removed the tail light housing and started preparation for the repair. The rest of the bed that was not damaged was masked off so paint overspray and dust don’t end up on the good area.

Our tech started the repair by sanding the entire passenger’s side of the bed. He pulled out the damaged dented area and used almost no filler to smooth out the damaged area. Several sandings with fine grit sandpaper brought the damaged area to a perfectly smooth surface. After the sanding, a coat of primer prepared the surface for the base coat of paint. The base coat of paint was then sealed with several layers of clear coat until we achieved the perfect sparkling finish.

With the damaged parts repaired and painted, a team of technicians assemble everything together and the truck is back in the perfect condition that it was in before the damage occurred.

It takes an extremely talented auto body shop team with experience and formal training to complete a task that requires precision repair like we did on this almost-new vehicle. Everything from proper auto body work without excess use of filler, down to the clear coat spraying is a highly skilled work that we do here at High Tone Auto Body. The owner of this vehicle was extremely pleased with the results.

January 22, 2014 by High Tone Autobody Leave a Comment

Repairing a minor front area damage on a Saab

Have you ever had a situation while pulling in your driveway, and you go one inch too far before making a turn and end up scraping the front left bumper? These minor accidents are very commonplace. They happen while pulling in or out of your garage, in a tight spot at the supermarket, or during parallel parking.

Most of the times, these minor accidents end up causing some damage in the front-right area, usually the bumper, indicator lights and sometimes even the right headlight suffers.

In this case, a silver Saab had this well-known damage: front right bumper and fender damage. As the Saab has the indicator lights embedded in the fender, the right indicator was broken too.

Saab Minor damage on front left bumper and indicator light — Minor damage on front left bumper and indicator light

As you can see on the image below, the Saab damage is not as big as it could have been. None of the body parts are broken or damaged beyond repair. The headlight got away by less than an inch, and the indicator lightbulb is not broken, so there was no electrical damage. This driver got lucky.

Minor damage of front bumper and indicator light — Indicator light broken and fender scratched. Headlight barely survived.

To repair this damage, we replaced the indicaror, did some body work on the bumper and fender, and gave them a fresh coat of paint to restore the looks to the original, pre-accident looks.

minor damage on front fender and indicator light — Front bumper and indicator light repaired, like-new looks

Thanks to our skilled technicians, this repair was done quickly and at minimum cost for the owner. The end result, as you can see from the image above, is flawless.

If you also have a similar problem with your vehicle, and would like to get it properly repaired without spending too much money, give us a call at 970.927.4351

January 20, 2014 by High Tone Autobody Leave a Comment

Nissan Collision Repair: An Unfortunate Encounter with a Deer

Deer collisions are unfortunate and common events on our roads. This is especially true for commuters in the Roaring Fork Valley.

Sometimes people ask us “Why do deer jump in front of a moving vehicle when they can easily just stay off the road and wait for the vehicle to pass by?” The simple answer is that they don’t see the world as we do. Here’s a very good explanation of why deer end up in front of a moving vehicle:

When deer see something coming at them, they take off running in a random direction, running away from the predator. Most of these potential prey species have eyes on opposing sides of the head, making depth perception very hard… This means that deer can’t tell how fast a car is moving, (or how far it is). Therefore, when a deer sees a vehicle, they take off in a random direction and sometimes that random direction happens to be in the path of the car. (Source)

This natural reaction of deer means that you have a 50-50 chance of hitting a deer if you see one running close to the road. This is why it is very important for yours and the safety of your loved ones to pay attention to road signs and adjust your speed accordingly.

In the image gallery below you can see how much damage a deer collision can cause even with to an SUV like this Nissan.

repaired Nissan Moriarty from a deer collision

This photo is from the vehicle after the repair. Thanks to the patience and hard work of our skilled auto body technicians, this SUV looks as good as ever. But it wasn’t so when it was towed in.

SUV damage from deer collision — The entire front area of the vehicle is damaged: right bumper, front bumper, hood, radiator…Massive damage

As the image reveals, the deer was obviously coming out of the woods and onto the road when this collision happened. In fact, the distinct damage on the right bumper reveals that this collision was probably caused by the deer “taking off in a random direction”… and ending up in front of this metallic predator. All jokes aside, this bad call the deer made caused significant damage, although the deer itself walked off.

Airbags went off at collision of a deer running in front of SUV — The impact was severe enough for the airbags to go off

Usually, if a driver notices the animal on collision course, things go by without any problems. But in this case, the deer came out of nowhere and the driver did not even have the time to slow down enough to avoid airbag activation. This of course increased the overall damage to the vehicle and its cost.

Because of the severity of this animal encounter, the front bumper and hood could not absorb the impact and the engine compartment and radiator were also damaged.

radiator damage on SUV from deer collision — The bumper was not able to absorb the collision, and the radiator is damaged beyond repair

The damage to the radiator was so severe that our technicians had to replace it altogether. The front structural beam of the engine compartment was also damaged and the repair technicians had to replace it, together with several other elements forming the headlight area.

frontal collision caused significant damage to this SUV — Right fender crumpled from the deer collision

With some technicians working on the frontal area of this Nissan SUV, another technician started working on the front door that was also damaged in the collision. The damage was not severe though, which was good news for the owner. A standard auto body set of repairs restored the like-new appearance of the door, ready for re-installment back on the vehicle where the broken mirror was replaced with a new one.

Front door repair damaged in deer collision — A spark of good luck: the deer was pushed off the road instead of ending up on top of the windshield

After removing all the damaged panels, technicians started working on the chassis of the vehicle, replacing or repairing any structural beams, the radiator and the radiator protective mesh were also replaced. After all the structural work was done, the Nissan Moriarty was ready for panel replacement.

Auto body repairs done, the Nissan awaits panel replacement phase

The finished work of this wildlife encounter was excellent. It is very difficult to make all parts fit flawlessly. This takes time, skills and great attention to detail. As you can see from the image below, the lines between different body parts are even. These even gaps are signs of a job well done.

As you can see from the image below, the edges between the right bumper, hood and front door are uniform on all their length. Achieving this precise alignment of all parts is a clear sign that this auto body repair was done by a team of detail-oriented professionals.

repaired SUV after deer collision — Notice the seamless joints between the various panels

We take pride in being so precise in our auto body repairs. There are very few auto body shops out there that complete their work with this level of attention to detail!

August 21, 2013 by High Tone Autobody Leave a Comment

Volvo S40 Collision Repair: Significant Front End Damage

Rarely a day goes by without someone, somewhere in the Aspen-Snowmass region experiencing the wildlife in Colorado a little bit too close. Especially during these winter days, wildlife encounters are all to frequent. Whether it is because of driving too fast, or because of driving through a particularly low-visibility situation, animals do get on the road, and we end up bumping into them. Sometimes it’s a minor scratch. But sometimes, animal collision can cause significant damage depending on the speed of travel.

Animal collision auto body repairs can get quite expensive and complicated when you have to do all the paperwork to sort things out with your insurance company. This is why we at High Tone Auto Body offer the complete service: paperwork and elbow grease.

In the images below, you can see how a Volvo S40 front end got severely damaged from a deer collision.

Collision repair Aspen CO — This Volvo S40 was damaged in a wildlife encounter. The deer walked away and the car had to be towed in.

Deer collision repair: Headlight, fender and hood damage

It doesn’t take much for a collision, especially when roads are slippery and wet. Even a 30mph speed is enough to cause significant damage when a collision with a large animal happens. In this case, the deer collision caused significant damage of the front end of this Volvo S40. As the image below shows, the hood is deformed, the left fender is twisted and torn at places, and the headlight assembly is completely destroyed.

Aspen auto body repair Snowmass. Deer collision repair — Left fender and headlight damage from deer collision

The front bumper and grill also got some damage.

The positive end of things was that none of the mechanical and electronic components of this car had any damage. The radiator was completely intact and the structural beams around the engine protected the wiring. Volvos are strong and sturdy vehicles.

Aspen auto body repair shop fast reliable deer collision repair — Localized but severe damage: broken headlight, bumper and deformed side panel and hood

To do this repair properly, we removed the front bumper, hood and left fender. Then we replaced all the parts that needed replacing: front headlight, fog lights built into the bumper, new grill, new bumper, new left fender.

After the repair: Car looks like new, client is very happy

While our tech’s were working on the vehicle itself, Tanja took care of all the paperwork with the insurance company. All in all, within a couple of days the owner of this vehicle had all the details sorted out, and the Volvo S40 looked like new.

Aspen auto body shop fixed collision car looks like new — After the repair: No signs of any sort, like-new looks of this Volvo S40

Thanks to our very friendly and competent staff, the repair experience was excellent.

August 14, 2013 by High Tone Autobody Leave a Comment

Pickup Truck Collision Aftermath: Repairing and repainting a tailgate after a car crash

You may be the best and safest driver in the world and all it takes is a split-second distraction for the driver behind you to slam into your car from the back and cause extensive damage to your vehicle.

This is exactly what happened to a middle-aged man. He stopped his pickup, waiting for a green light when another pickup truck rear ended him. The damage was extensive for both trucks.

Insurance Claim Processing and New Parts Delivery

The cautious driver came to High Tone Auto Body for a complete repair of the tailgate and new rear bumper. The tail lights also needed replacement. While Tanja handled the insurance paper work the technicians in the auto body shop removed the damaged bumper, tail lights and tail gate. We use replacement Original Equipment Manufacturer (OEM) parts for a seamless fit.

Matching the New Paint To The Original Deep Cherry Red Truck Color

The new tailgate came in with an E-coat, black in color directly from the manufacturer. The new tailgate was cleaned with wax and grease remover, then sanded, cleaned again with wax and grease remover, then one coat of sealer was applied, followed by three coats of base coat red. Once the basecoat was flashed off, the protective clear coat was applied twice to ensure the proper millage (thickness) of clear for ultimate UV radiation protection.

The painter weighs out the different components of toners, reducers and additives to come up with the exact color match to the customers vehicle. Each component is weighed to the gram. The painter can replicate any shade and color on any car on the market.

mixing the colors for spraying the crashed truck — Adding Component Colors to get the original truck color

Once the paint toners were all measured by the gram on the digital scale, the paint technician mixed with appropriate reducer to make up the matching deep cherry red paint and was ready for spraying the panels.

computer controlled car paint making — Components and base color mixed up to get the desired deep cherry red.

With properly mixed paint and the tail gate inside the downdraft booth, the certified paint technician was ready for base coat application to the tail gate.

painting a crashed car with deep cherry red — Sealer was applied and painter is now putting on application of deep cherry red base

Collision repair truck tailgate repaint — 3 coats of deep cherry red base coats, now ready for clear coat

If the base coat paint layers do not get covered with a protective clear coat, the paint will quickly fade away. Without the clear coat there is no protection from the suns harmful UV rays. The added benefit of the clear coat is that it gives the paint a mirror like finish that also protects the vehicle from the elements.

Collision repair tailgate clear coat spraying — Spraying the protective clear coat layers

Collision repair Aspen, CO. tailgate painted and ready for installment — 2 coats of clear applied, now ready for baking

With the tail gate properly painted and clear coated after being baked, it was ready for installment on the truck. The finished repair took only a couple of days. The insurance covered all the repair expenses and the client left very pleased with the service and quality of work. Since then he referred several other clients for auto body and paint repair services.