Originally Posted by Trimmy
Hi all
Anyone ever tried this? I have a small dent which happened at the dealer. They want to respray the whole panel and fill it. Im not happy with that and think it can be done as a paintless repair. But before I call in the pros thought I would see if this works first. The dent seems to be about the same as the one in the youtub movie below. Anyone else tried this, would it damage the paint in any way? I cant see it does but second opinions always help and you guys are great with your views.
YouTube - dent removal
From an engineering perspective, this is virtually impossible. The temperature difference between a hairdryer and compressed air is infinitesimal on the material scale of steel or aluminum.
MAYBE if your car had body panels made of recycled thermoplastic this might have a chance of working, but most likely not. Dry ice will also not work, as you are talking perhaps a hundred or so degress kelvin of actual temperature difference.
Modern paintless dent repair is cheap ($100 or less) and they use some very interesting tools nowadays, including AC induction heating devices to remove dents using HF RF skin-effect heating. The result is localized heating at up to 1000 degrees or more of heat.