Anyone have ideas on where to get a hood for a 4 cylinder 95 accord? Ebay has OEM knock offs that are primed selling for 150 shipped. Anyone know if this is a good deal?

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/HOOD-...Q5fAccessories

Or if you know of other ideas to find a hood let me know! Thanks.

 

Call the local junk yards.

 

x 2. Or just go if they're close enough

 

Ya i too think that you can call or just go to your nearest local car shop and ask them about the hood.

 

if you want it to fit well, go with a used OEM hood. Some aftermarket hoods are great, but i have dealt with some really bad ones.

 

Thanks for the suggestions. I actually found a new one, primed for 100 bucks from a local junkyard. I thought it was decent since another guy was going to sell me a used one for 70.

As far as painting it -- anyone have experience using the spray paint from one of these paint matching places? Apparently they pull the vin of your car and match the color exactly to the factory color.. One thing I'm worried about is that my car must have faded some (it's a 95) but I don't know if it will be too dramatic a difference.

Thanks,

Matt

 

you would have been better off with the used hood unless the hood you bought is brand new OEM. if you buy something primed, you don't know what is under that primer (new hoods are actually electrocoated). Also, do not try to paint the hood with spray cans. you will ruin it. get it painted by a pro if you have no experience. it will be worth the money and he will also need to blend the paint onto the fenders for a decent match, unless your car is black or a very dark color.

 

It's going to be hard to not have it stick out since your only painting one part of the car, but if you need a hood it's better than having it just primed.

Edit: Unless you do like said above and get a professional to paint/blend it

 

If you pull the paint code and get new paint, it will not match very well. It will be decent, but the new paint will be brighter than the old paint.

I left my hood up, like an idiot, and it bent over my windshield when I started to drive. I bought a used grey hood, stripped and primed it and painted it the red/maroon... and I can paint pretty well. You can really tell when you take a medium look, even though the hood turned out nearly perfect - the hood looks new and the rest of the car looks 18 years old. Next time, I would have looked a little harder for a used red/maroon hood.

 

damn all the places I talked to want CRAZY money to paint the hood / blend the fenders. I figured it would stick out like a sore thumb to just paint the hood. Now I don't know what to do...

Thanks for the help so far fellas.

-Matt

 

Just called Maaco and they said it would be cheaper to paint to whole damn car than to paint hood and blend it! haha.
Maaco can actually do the whole car for $400, which isn't bad for the whole car primered, painted, and clear coated, but it's still way more than I want to shell out at the moment...

Also can anyone enlighten me on what some of the problems are with the NON-OEM replacement hoods?

Thanks,

Matt

 

are you sure that $400 is all that you listed... they told me $250 to paint the car... that is labor only since i have to do all the prep work and even buy the paint and clear for them to do it...

 

DO NOT have your entire car painted just because it seems like a better deal than just the hood. a $400 paint job will look terrible (if the paint stays on). You should expect to pay at least $2000 for a proper paint job (including trim removal to do it right). If you only need the hood painted, you should be able to get a decent job for about $300+ about another 200 to blend fenders. Aftermarket hoods are okay if they are the top of the line ones, but often they do not fit as well and the ecoat isn't as smooth as a factory part. This causes your paint to be rougher and decreases adhesion unless you sand it flat, but you'll often end up sanding thru it to do that.

 

I won't look like a sore thumb, but you can tell. Most people don't notice mine until I mention it to them... but then it is as plain as day.

 

Thanks.