TireSmoke.org

More pics.

-BP

I assume he will blend it into the driver door and passenger front fender.

Clean shop he has

Yes, he talked about blending into the driver's door. He said the hardest part for him is getting his smooth paint to match the factory orange peel. There's nothing in his shop that isn't glass smooth. It's pretty amazing.

-BP

There's some paint going on! The door is blended too, but I got that picture through FB messenger and can't forward it to my email... On the grill I bought, the chrome was peeling a little, so I decided to see if he could just paint it body color instead of finding another one. He was able to strip the chrome off the plastic and says it should be good. It's in the pictures below in primer. They did them in body color on the Xtreme S10s so I know what it will look like. The whole front end will now be body color. Something I've wanted for a long time really.

-BP

Looks like all the parts are in and I'm guessing painted at this point. It's Thursday, so I'm guessing this will be a next week finish unless something pops up.

-BP

I haven't posted in a few days, but the truck is basically done at this point. Jim is trying to contact State Farm about the addition to the repair claim he submitted. I'll call State Farm on Tuesday to try and move it along so I can get the truck back before it snows again. Here's a bunch more pictures from the last few days.

-BP

The truck is basically done and has returned home. I only say basically because it has to go back for a wet sand and buff after some time for the paint to really dry out. I'll most likely bring it back in the Spring when I can drive it there and back. It turned out nice, and the longer it sits, the better the paint looks. The reality is that nobody would know the difference if I didn't tell them, and that's the idea. Is it completely perfect? No, but the truck wasn't perfect from the factory, so I'm good. I like the way the painted grill and lower facia under the bumper turned out. I forgot to take a picture under the hood, where it looks way better than before. I'll snap that soon.
I picked it up last Wed but it was misting enough for me to not want to leave it outside for pictures. It did make it home clean without any road splash, which was nice.

-BP

A long story short, State Farm didn't want to pay my claim and instead wanted to total the truck out. After several hours of discussion, emails, and visits from an estimator, the truck will maintain it's clear title status. The sad part is that they're only going to pay about $3400 of my $4800 bill. The lesson learned here is I need collector car insurance and the day I receive the check from them and deposit it, I will be switching my three toys over to Hagerty or Grundy so this doesn't happen again.

-BP

BTW, the $4800 was light as I bought a hood, headlights, grill, and fender on my own dime adding another $450 or so to the tally.

-BP

Insurance is kind of bullshit. They always look for ways to keep the $ for themselves.

Agreed. It's why you see extremely high paid celebrities in all of the ads on TV and their HQ buildings are off the charts. It's big business for sure. But the lesson is to get the best insurance for your application, and I definitely did not do that.

-BP

Hey BP, I have Hagerty's for my TBSS and the Corvette. Including the optional "Driver's Club" (for towing), my cost for the upcoming year was $600. But, don't be surprised when you lose your multicar discount from State Farm and your bill for your remaining cars goes up.

I'm actually expecting them to jack my rate up anyway because I actually made a claim. Another lose/lose scenario. I remember getting a quote on three cars a couple years back with agreed value insurance and it was about $1000/year through Hagerty. We'll see what it is with the Vette, S10, and GT500.

-BP