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What Goes Into Preparing Your Auto Body Panels for Panel Beating

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Road accidents are every driver's nightmare. They are a typical reference for the common saying "when it rains, it pours." This is true when you think about the risks involved to your wellbeing and the costs that come with fixing your car. Thankfully, auto body repair shops have ways of fixing your vehicle in the most affordable way. Processes such as panel beating are an easy take for experienced and skilled technicians. They will restore your vehicle's body panels to the manufacturer's standards. When looking for a panel beating facility, it helps to understand the work that goes into repairing your smashed car. Here is what happens during the preparation stage. 

Removing the Underbody Coatings

Your vehicle has different coatings protecting the various components. These coatings often vary in thickness, texture, and type to meet the localized conditions surrounding the car's parts. For instance, a paint coating underneath the bonnet must be made to withstand high temperature coming from the engine. It will not have the same properties as the protective coatings used for the interior. Either way, preparing for a panel beating procedure begins with removing the existing coatings to pave way for the works that will follow. The smash repair experts will also remove seals, deadeners, and other protective elements that will prevent the damaged panels from receiving the full corrective forces.

Damage Rough-out  

The next step is roughing out the damage. Here, the smash repairs experts use hand-held tools to reshape the smashed area back to its original form and contour. Car manufacturer's detail the body panels to give car the visual appeal that the buyer wants. These panels are crafted to perfection, and the repair must ensure that the roughing out process is inch perfect. 

Ideally, the objective here is to locate the lowest point of the damage based on how much the damaged area carved in. The repair technicians strike the area with nearly the same force that forced it to curve out of shape.  

Planishing

Planishing is the final step of the preparation stage in panel beating repairs. Planishing implies restoring the damaged area to the original plane. It takes over the bumps and hollows on the damaged area and smoothens them to an even plane that feels smooth to your touch. Often, the repair experts use a steel stake and special planishing hammer to correct the imperfections from the previous stage. They do this while monitoring with planning devices to ensure that the surface is as even as possible. 


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