Depth
How far the metal moved, and how sharply it moved. Two dents the same width across are not the same job if one of them is a crease.
Paintless dent repair for motorcycle fenders, Harley-Davidson most of all. Most fenders arrive off the bike already, and that is the easiest version of this job. The metal is worked from behind, so the paint on it is the paint that leaves with it. Pinstripes and graphics included.
Forty-one seconds. The fender is off the bike and mounted on a stand, the damage is read under a line board, and the metal is worked back from behind. No filler and no paint. This is the job this page describes.
The fender is off the bike and mounted on a stand. That is the setup Myke described: clamped down, it can be turned and held at angles that are not available while it is bolted to a motorcycle.
The dent is read under a line board. Straight lines are the only honest way to judge sheet metal. If the reflection bends, the repair is not finished.
Then it is worked back from behind. No filler, no repaint, and the paint that arrived on the fender is the paint that leaves on it.
41 seconds · Harley-Davidson rear fender · filmed at the Escondido shop
Tank work, filmed in full. Different part, identical approach: read the damage, get behind it, move the metal in small increments, never touch the paint. The motorcycle gas tank dent repair page covers that side of the work.
Drag or use the arrows · tap watch for full screen
About half the time, no. Where the dent sits decides it, and there is a reliable tell.
The tire is in the way. There is no room to get a tool behind the fender, and no amount of patience changes that. This one comes off.
The tell: if the shocks bottomed out and the tire came up into the fender, the damage is up top by definition. Those almost always come off the bike.
There is room to work, and the tire stops being an obstacle and becomes useful. It turns into a leverage point to push against.
The tell: if the back of the dent can be reached cleanly with the wheel on, the fender stays where it is and you keep your afternoon.
Most paintless dent repair companies are mobile only. A van, a set of rods, and whatever light they can find. That covers a door ding in an office park. It does not cover a motorcycle fender.
Off the bike, a fender goes into a vise. Clamped down, it can be turned and held at angles that are not available while it is bolted to a motorcycle. That is the difference between reaching the dent and reaching it well, and it is why the result is better even on jobs that could have been done on the bike.
Dent Time runs mobile service across San Diego County and a shop in Escondido. That is the whole point. The repair happens where the result is best, not where the van already is.
Off the bike, clamped, worked with full access. Pictured is a tank on the same bench a fender goes on.
This is the detail that separates a fender from a car door, and it is where the damage gets done by people who do not know it.
Hand-painted pinstripes, candy, metalflake and graphics under clear do not stretch the way the metal beneath them does. Move the fender cold and the paint is what fails first. It crazes, it lifts, it cracks along the stripe. The metal came back fine and the fender is still ruined.
So the fender gets heat. Warm paint stays pliable and travels with the metal while it is worked back and forth. It is slower, it is deliberate, and it is the reason a striped fender is worth saving in the first place. Once a hand-painted stripe is gone, nobody is recreating it to match the tank.
Tell us before we start. If there is a stripe or a graphic anywhere near the damage that changes how the repair is approached, and it is usually why we ask for the fender in the shop rather than working it in your garage.
There is no motorcycle price list, because a fender dent is priced the way every dent is priced.
How far the metal moved, and how sharply it moved. Two dents the same width across are not the same job if one of them is a crease.
The friendliest dent on a fender is in the middle of it. The closer to an edge, the harder, because the metal is crowned there and there is far less room behind it.
Whether the fender comes off, and whether anything has to be removed to reach the back of the dent. This is the one that decides your afternoon.
Pinstripes and graphics mean heat, and heat means a slower, more deliberate repair. Worth every extra minute, since a hand-painted stripe cannot be put back.
Text photos and you get a real number back, usually within minutes. Myke reads motorcycle photos himself rather than running them through a calculator, because the variables on a bike do not reduce to a slider.
What moves a PDR priceRiders outside San Diego County send fenders in the same way they send tanks. Since most fenders are off the bike before we ever see them, shipping one is barely a different job.
Text photos first, so you know the number before anything moves.
Pack the fender and include a prepaid return label.
We repair it, then photograph it before it ships back, so you see the result before it is in a box.
Text photos of the damage and you get a real number back, usually within minutes. Harley, sport bike, cruiser or import. On the bike or off.