Honda Door Ding on the fly
One of my friends and I had been talking about repairing a small dent located on his passenger front door. It was no bigger than a dime, so we scheduled a time for me to come by and knock it out for him. As I said, the dent was on his passenger front door, so to gain access I used a window wedge as well as a glass protector to safely push the metal from the backside. It is extremely important that when gaining access through the top of the door that you use the window shield, otherwise you could easily scratch the glass- Paintless Dent Repair technicians use steel rods with a variety of different shapes designed to create leverage and push dents out from the back side. Stainless steel putting pressure on and sliding against glass is an easy way to cause damage, but the window guard ensures that doesn’t happen by helping displace the pressure put on the glass by the steel rod and prevents direct contact between the rod and the window.
Once I had access with the window protected, it was time to set up my light and start pushing. A paintless dent repair light casts a reflection on the outside of the panel, and a technician can use that light to determine exactly where their tool is on the panel. As the lines come together on that reflection they indicate where the PDR tool is putting pressure. So once my light was set up I grabbed my Door Lord from Tequila Tools, and within a few minutes and a few pushes the dent was gone. Metal reflection is a little funny though- the closer your light is the less you see. So while the dent appeared to be fixed, I moved my light back a few more feet and could see that there were a few low spots left indicated by the lines on my reflection having an “Owl Eye” shape. No big deal, a few more pushes and we were able to restore the panel back to its factory condition.
Bonus Content: “Owl Eyes” occur when the panel a technician is working on has a low spot. In the before photo you can see where the lines on the reflection board start out straight and then separate from each other. Go ahead and scroll back up and take a look.
Thats the owl eye. So what do you think happens when a tech pushes the metal too far and creates a high spot? It’s actually pretty intuitive- the lines go from being straight to pinching together. I know what you’re thinking, “How do you fix metal thats been pushed too much and created a high spot?” I’m glad you asked. You simply knock it back down. Sometimes with a hammer (a special hammer made for this, not the 20 oz ball peen hammer you have in the garage) but most of the time a tech will use a rubber mallet and a nylon knock down tool. And you don’t even need a PDR light to see these high spots, the vehicles clear coat reflects light so well that you can tell there’s a high spot if you know what to look for. Light will appear to bend around a high spot, it’s a little hard to describe but you’ll know it when you see it!
