This is how to fix your car's dents with a GoPro

Zach Bowman — Sun, 25 Nov 2012 20:01:00 EST

Body shops employ all kinds of sorcery when it comes to correcting crimes against sheetmetal. Their arsenal of tools is wide and varied and almost always includes a massive suction cup or two. You know, just like the powerful GoPro suction mount.

A skilled hand can apply the suction cup, give a swift yank and fix large, unsightly dents as if they were never there. Curious to apply the theory to your own bruised fender? You're in luck. The video below shows a handful of Kiwis getting crafty with a GoPro mount to fix the rear quarter on their Starlet GT.

Don't have a GoPro? Don't sweat it. Depending on the size and location of your ding, you can pull off the same trick with a little water and an old-school toilet plunger. The move has been saving teenagers from parents' wrath for years. Check out the clip below to see just how well the suction-cup bodywork fix turns out.

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This is how to fix your car's dents with a GoPro originally appeared on Autoblog on Sun, 25 Nov 2012 20:01:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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DentBetty provides body shop estimates from your uploaded photos

Dan Roth — Sun, 03 Oct 2010 17:45:00 EST

Filed under: Etc., Technology

Whether the cretin responsible for flattening the grille of your mint Isuzu Impulse left a note or not, the damage wrought on your vehicle is going to require repair. DentBetty streamlines the traditional pain-in-the-tuchas process of traipsing around to various body shops to get estimates for cosmetic repairs. Any incident that results in structural damage still requires a firsthand look by body professionals, but cosmetic damage is a very common annoyance that many people forgo repairing due to the aggravation.

DentBetty is up and running in California, Massachusetts and New York, with a total of about 120 participating shops so far. Vehicle owners can visit the DentBetty website and upload at least two photos of their car's damage. Participating repair facilities will then respond with estimates. The web-based form also asks whether the repair will be paid for by insurance or personally, and both users and shops are rated, so feedback scores can factor in to the decision-making process. It's a nice insulator between you and the repair facility; DentBetty doesn't share your email with the shops, and you're not asked for credit card information, either. Eventually, the DentBetty service will be branched out to SMS messaging, and a smartphone app doesn't sound like much of a stretch, either.

[Source: Mashable.com]

DentBetty provides body shop estimates from your uploaded photos originally appeared on Autoblog on Sun, 03 Oct 2010 17:45:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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