Hello all...new Chevy owner, 2007 Suburban 2500

[Derick]

Howdy all. I'm new into the Chevy full size community. I previously had a 2006 Toyota Sequoia and while it was a very nice truck, I needed a little more 'oomph' for hauling my 23' toy hauler. My neurotic chevy loving buddy got me turned onto getting a chevy, and seeing how they made a 3/4 ton suburban, that worked perfectly. Previously it was a fire chief's vehicle somewhere in IL before it was sold to the second owner, who then sold it to me. It had a laundry list of little issues, but I've done the following;

-Taken in for a whole vehicle (minus roof) paint correction (paint was deeply scratched, and had runs from a previously awful touch up job)
-Replaced mirrors w/ tow mirrors
-Replaced all headlight and tail light lenses
-unfunked the fire department wiring, thus fixing the bright lights and DRLs
-Replaced bump stops w/ 3000 lb timbren suspension enhancement system
-Replaced junk brake controller with my Prodigy P3
-Synthetic Oil change
-Power steering fluid flush and change
-Seafoam'd the intake
-Polished and waxed



That's the short list for now. Lot's more to do. Primary focus for myself is to start scraping and brushing the underside rust in preparation for undercoating in oil.

 

[nadthomas]

Looks pretty good. Keep up the good work.

 

[Miami-Dade]

Looks real good all cleaned up!! I am sure when it was the Fire Chief's vehicle it was well maintained.

Welcome from Miami Beach&NYC Derick!!

 

[swathdiver]

Looks good Derick and welcome! What does paint correction entail?

 

[Derick]

Well, I pondered on what I wanted to do about the paint. The two rear quarter panels were trashed by someone who doesnt know how to paint properly. Let's just say, when you take it to the body shop, and they yell, "HEY GARY! COME CHECK THIS OUT!!!!!" it never bodes well.

So the first shop I stopped at wanted about 1800 bucks to fix "some" of the problems. As a fire department vehicle, this thing had seen some rough times, and had a few gouges in the doors, the handles were all scratched up, the roof is trashed with scratches and had two huge sharp dents that had rusted. They were going to sand and repaint those two rear quarter panels, and then do some other corrective stuff...all in all, it was more than I wanted to pay. Last resort was Maaco.

Second place I stopped at I had spoken with before. They build custom mustangs and the englishman that ran the place was starting to get his feet wet in the pickup market. Buying, fixing, refurbing, and flipping them. He wanted 4k to do a 'mediocre' paint job. Now, granted, I am quite sure it would have looked amazing. I dont know his reputation, but I had seen what he was working on in his shop, and the work looked very good. I wasnt going to spend 4k.

I posted on reddit in indy about a budget paint shop...and yeah I get it, you get what you pay for. I went to this place that someone suggested, and the older timer that ran the place looked it all over, runs on both rear quarter panels, rust and chipping on the rear wiper hole, lots of misc scratches and damage on the doors, and lots of rock chips and usual day to day stuff on the hood. 1200 bucks he said. I said, I'll be back in two weeks to drop it off.

So what they did was repaint a lot of, I dont exactly know what they painted, and what they buffed out...but instead of looking like a 300k mile truck, it looks like a decently taken care of 140k mile truck. Some of the other misc damages came out with buffing and waxing. I'm assuming the factory clear coat is trashed or painted over at this point, so keeping it waxed will be important.

What I did find was rust in the lower edge of the rear doors. They seem to retain water for reasons unknown...so maybe come fall I'll sand those down, bondo, and repaint. I cant paint for crap but maybe being that low my crappy job will go unnoticed. I just dont want it to get worse and start climbing the door.