Paint and Body
Dent Removal and Repair in Southern California
Typical range
$300 to $4,500
Shop hours
1 to 20
Labor rate
$210/hr
The short answer
Dent removal covers paintless dent repair, conventional pull and fill, and aluminum panel work on RVs, vans, trailers, and fleet vehicles. Work runs $300 to $4,500, or 1 to 20 hours at $210 per hour plus materials where refinish is required.
01
What this work actually involves
Whether a dent can be pushed out without paint comes down to three things: whether the metal was stretched, whether the paint cracked, and whether there is access behind the panel. Paintless dent repair works by massaging the metal back through its own memory, which only exists if the impact did not exceed the yield point. A soft hail dimple on a box truck roof has memory. A sharp crease from a loading dock corner does not, and no amount of pushing will make it lie flat without filler.
RVs complicate all of it. Laminated sidewalls have no rear access at all, because there is adhesive, luan, foam, and interior panel behind the skin. Filon over luan does not have metal memory in the first place, so a dent in an RV sidewall is usually a delamination question rather than a dent question, and pushing on it from behind is how you turn a cosmetic dimple into a separated panel. On stick-and-tin aluminum trailers the skin work is real dent work, but aluminum stretches more permanently than steel and work-hardens fast, so it takes heat management and patience.
The hail claims we see cluster after inland and high desert storms, Victorville, Palmdale, Hesperia, and the Big Bear corridor. Hail on a fleet of vans is high-volume paintless work if it is caught before the panels get repainted by somebody else. Hail on an RV roof is frequently a structural and sealing question first, because the impacts land on rooftop AC shrouds, vents, and skylights that crack and then leak.
Location: All work is performed at our Yorba Linda facility. We do not offer mobile, roadside, or fleet route service.
02
What the job includes
- Paintless dent repair on steel and aluminum panels with rear access
- Hail damage repair across roofs, hoods, and upper body panels
- Door ding, cart strike, and parking damage repair
- Sharp crease and stretched-metal repair with conventional pull, fill, and refinish
- Glue pull repair where the back side of the panel is inaccessible
- Aluminum panel work with controlled heat and shrinking
- Dent assessment on laminated RV sidewalls, including delamination screening
- Rooftop AC shroud, vent, and skylight damage assessment after hail
- Panel replacement recommendation where repair exceeds the panel value
- Refinish and blend where the paint did not survive the repair
03
When you need this service
- A field of round dimples across horizontal panels after a hail event
- A door ding with the paint intact and no crease at the center
- A sharp crease from a dock, post, or corner strike
- A dent in an RV sidewall that sounds hollow when tapped around its edge
- An aluminum trailer panel that has oil-canned and will not stay flat
- A dent with cracked or flaking paint at the deepest point
04
How we do it, step by step
- 01
Map and classify
Every dent measured, marked, and classified as pushable or not, based on crease sharpness, paint condition, and whether the metal was stretched past its memory.
- 02
Access assessment
We determine what has to come off to reach the back of the panel. On laminated RV walls there is no rear access, which changes the approach entirely.
- 03
Delamination screening on RV panels
Any sidewall dent gets tap tested around its perimeter first, because pushing on a panel that is already separating turns a cosmetic dimple into a structural repair.
- 04
Paintless work
Metal massaged back with rods or glue pulls in small increments under reflective line lighting, working the high spots down as the low spot comes up.
- 05
Conventional repair where required
Creased or stretched panels pulled, shrunk where the metal grew, then filled thin and blocked flat rather than built up thick to hide a poor pull.
- 06
Refinish
Where the paint did not survive, the area is primed, sealed, color matched off the actual panel, and blended into the adjacent film.
- 07
Final inspection under line light
Every repair checked under a reflector board at multiple angles. A dent that reads flat under shop light is often still visible outdoors in low sun.
05
Pricing and posted rates
| Item | Rate or range | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Typical job range | $300 to $4,500 | Varies with extent of damage and parts availability |
| Shop hours | 1 to 20 | Quoted after teardown, not before |
| Body and paint labor | $210 per hour | 2026 posted rate |
| Paint supplies | $55 per paint hour | Calculated automatically on every estimate |
| Body supplies | $5 per body hour | Calculated automatically on every estimate |
| Parts | 100% markup under $100, 35% over | Special order parts require a non refundable deposit at order |
| Deposit | 50% at authorization over $2,000 | Additional 25% when parts arrive on jobs over $10,000 |
| Sales tax | 7.75% on parts and materials | Labor is not taxed |
Insurance billed jobs may be billed at carrier negotiated labor rates that differ from the posted retail rates above. See all posted rates.
06
On the insurance side
Hail is typically a comprehensive loss. We document rooftop plastics and seals as part of the scope, since those are the items that leak later if left off the estimate.
07
Vehicles we do this work on
Vehicle
Cargo Vans
Cargo vans on Transit, ProMaster, Express, and Sprinter platforms carry trade tools, parts inventory, and route freight. Rear door
Vehicle
Sprinter Vans
Mercedes Sprinter vans run last-mile routes, trade service, and camper conversions across Southern California. Sliding door tracks
Vehicle
Box Trucks
Box trucks put a separately built cargo body on a cab chassis, and the joint between them is where most failures start. Rear frame
Vehicle
Travel Trailers
A travel trailer tows from a ball hitch behind the tow vehicle rear axle on an A-frame tongue, which makes it the most sway-prone
Vehicle
Utility Trailers
A utility trailer is an open deck on a welded frame with fenders, a ramp gate, and lighting, and it fails through deck rot, frame
Vehicle
Electric Delivery Vans
Electric delivery vans including the Rivian EDV used by Amazon Logistics have a floor-mounted battery pack, bonded composite body
Vehicle
High-Cube Vans
High-cube vans trade a tall roof and maximum interior volume for a large flat sail area and a roofline that clears almost nothing.
08
Questions about dent removal and repair
Frequently asked questions
Can paintless dent repair work on my RV?
On the aluminum skin of a stick-and-tin trailer, sometimes, with careful heat management. On a laminated fiberglass sidewall, generally no. There is no rear access and no metal memory, and pushing from behind risks separating the skin from the substrate. We tap test around every sidewall dent before deciding, because what looks like a dent is frequently early delamination.
How much does dent repair cost?
$300 to $4,500, or 1 to 20 hours at $210 per hour plus materials where refinish is needed. A single accessible door ding on a cargo van sits at the low end. Multi-panel hail damage, or a deep crease requiring pull, shrink, fill, and a blended refinish across a large panel, sits at the high end.
Is hail damage covered by insurance?
Hail is a comprehensive claim on most policies and is generally covered subject to your deductible. Get the vehicle documented before any panel gets repainted for an unrelated reason, because a repainted panel complicates the hail scope. On RVs we also inspect rooftop AC shrouds, vents, and skylights, since cracked rooftop plastics are the part of a hail claim that later leaks.
Why do you say some dents cannot be pushed out?
Because metal only returns to shape while it is inside its elastic memory. A soft round dimple deformed the panel without exceeding the yield point, so it will come back. A sharp crease exceeded it and permanently stretched the metal, which means there is now more surface area than the panel needs. That extra material has to be shrunk or filled, not pushed.
Will the repair be invisible?
On a clean paintless repair with no stretched metal, yes, under any lighting. On a filled and refinished repair, the goal is that it cannot be found by touch or under raking light. We check every repair with a reflector board at multiple angles rather than under flat shop light, because low afternoon sun is far more revealing than a ceiling fixture.
09
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More paint and body work
Ready to move on dent removal and repair? Bring it to Yorba Linda.