A scratch is the most common damage we see and the one people most often put off. Karbase repairs car scratches from our Great South Road workshop in Otahuhu, and how we fix it depends entirely on how deep it has gone.
How deep is the scratch?
Car paint is layered: clear coat on top, colour beneath it, then primer, then bare metal. Where the scratch stops decides the repair and the cost.
- Clear coat only — the scratch is visible but your fingernail does not catch in it. Usually corrected with machine cut and polish, no repainting at all.
- Through to the colour — your nail catches slightly and the mark stays visible when wet. Needs colour-matched touch-up or a localised respray.
- Down to primer or metal — you can see grey or bare steel. This one is urgent, because exposed metal starts corroding.
Run a wet finger over it. If the scratch disappears while wet, it is almost certainly clear coat only and the cheapest of the three to fix.
Why a deep scratch is worth fixing now
Once the scratch is through to the metal, water sits in it. In Auckland’s humidity that becomes surface rust within months and a rust repair within a year or two — a job costing many times what the original scratch would have.
Small paint damage caught early is genuinely the cheapest work we do.
Colour matching
We match to your vehicle’s factory paint code rather than eyeballing it, then blend the repair into the surrounding panel so there is no hard edge where old meets new. On metallics and pearls the blend matters more than the mix — it is what stops a repair looking like a repair.
Getting a price
Send a photo of the scratch to 027 549 4113 and we will tell you which of the three categories it falls into and roughly what it costs. If it is shallow enough that a polish will lift it, we will say so.
Find us
Karbase Panel & Paint
2/127 Great South Road, Otahuhu, Auckland 1062
Phone: 027 549 4113
Open Monday to Saturday, 9am–5pm.
Areas we serve
Otahuhu · Onehunga · Penrose · Papatoetoe · Manukau · Papakura
