Thanks for the comments guys, I really don't care when its done as long he keeps me informed and lets me know if any unknown issues arise. The last car I had painted took twice as long and cost twice as much as I was quoted even though shop owner told me it was only car they ever tore apart that they didn't find any bad surprises on.

I'm a boiler inspector by trade and if I'm a half hour late for something people are calling or texting me wanting to know when I'll be there so I thought waiting a couple months about something so expensive was being fairly patient. If I don't hear from him for a couple more months I'll be looking for a new painter.

Last 2 years I've really made it a point to not use folks who can't communicate and who are even close on quotes. So if it was me, I'd move on. You know he's gonna take way longer and have excuses.

Body shops are not normally known for doing a complete paint job on time. You should always plan to spend more money before the car is ready to come home. When the shop was doing mine, I was able to see the car whenever I wanted. This shop was 2 miles from my house & had a good reputation of doing nice work. The owner is a car guy himself & has several rare Ford muscle cars. The draw back was that they also do insurance work which of course is their bread & butter. They had my car for 1.5 years & things changed during the time it was there. More work was required after the media stripping was done. I had different ideas on how "I" expected the car to be properly restored. Wasn't looking for a highly detailed, over restored job. Wanted the car to be more like factory job. The painters had to go through some serious educating & discussions. Most people don't want cars done that way. When this happens, more time & materials are required. We discovered some paint color prices are through the roof depending on what toners are used. Daytona yellow was 1,100.00 a gallon x 2. Just a little food for thought......Good luck....Joe

"Daytona yellow was 1,100.00 a gallon x 2. Just a little food for thought"

WOW!! Now thats a eye opener! Thanks Joe

Gregg

High quality paint in the "correct" color for vintage cars is VERY expensive.

I'm with you Joe, last car I had painted was identical to this one and the materials alone were $3800.

I was having lunch with the local US district attorney 20 years ago and he stated that the biggest complaint they had with attorneys is not keeping their clients informed of the progress on the case. He stated that a lawyer could provide terrible actual work, yet keep their clients informed and have no complaints whereas someone could provide stellar work and not keep the client informed and have complaint after complaint pile up.

I'm not worried about being informed once the work starts as we've already agreed I'll stop by every couple weeks to check out the progress and square up on the bills. I'm concerned about him telling me he'd be ready for the car by the end of May though and still not being ready in August without a call or a text. I guess its a principle thing to me and I still expect a persons word to mean something even though society seems to be going the other way.

Personally I'd really struggle with using him unless you literally have no options. Also I'll use out of state people over locals if the non local folks have a great rep and really good communication.

I know friends have used Jim Plimpton and also Kurt Anderson in WI for high end muscle cars if you want their contact info.

If something happened and he had to redo some or all the paint of the current car I could see where he could lose time to communicate with a "potential" customer (Im sure if hes any good he has a list a mile long of people that would take a spot - imagine trying to keep 3, 4, or 5 of those people updated - at a half hour a call). Its summer time and people are going in a thousand directions esp if he has kids and then add a small mistake. If that were the case you wouldnt even register on my list of people to call. What I would like to know here is the person with the car currently there, are they getting the needed calls or updates?

Now if he was a professional with a complete staff yes then you should expect updates on when to bring it in...

I also get how many people have been burned by body shops and one should be very cautious when choosing to do business with one. This thread is reminder why I do my own work and have only myself to blame. If I were/had to send a car off I would send it to one of the pros that frequent this site.

Best of luck