I've a 2006 with 2,500 miles.
Took the car for a short roadtrip this past weekend & upon returning washed it.

At the rear corner of the driver's side door, and at one point on the passenger's side door (same place) I see an area that looks as if it'd been sandblasted, the paint's totally gone.
Obviously road sand's been spraying against those surfaces and the result is not pretty.

I'd bought the mudflaps Ed sells here on the forum & had them on the car before the 100 mile mark.
So the rearend parts notorious for this kind of thing look pristine.
But on the bottom of the doors, that I'd not heard of before nor recall anyone else report this as of yet.

Any thought(s) about this?

Should I take it to the dealer & file a claim & if so, for what?
The thought of mixing it up with a service advisor at my dealership has all the appeal of getting a root canal.

I'd hate to see what the entire bottom area would look like at this early stage had I not had mudflaps on the car, that's for damned sure.
Needless to say I'm not a very happy camper right now.

Love to hear if anyone else has experienced this, and what they either plan to do or have done about it.

 

Never seen the condition - wonder whats up? 14,000 mi. on mine, and no paint issues.

 

There were some early posts where guys with the 2005's were noticing this. It seemed to have been caused or exacerbated by a misalignment (the door sits further inboard than the fender) of the door and the forwardmost edge of the rear quarter. I think that some were able to place a small or thin "bumper" on the door frame to force the door to align. I later read that this might not be the thing to do as it stressed the door material.

I don't remember who pointed it out, but for a while we were all checking just rear of the doors down low for abrasion...I never did see any on my 05, and my alignment seems fine.

Hope this helps some.
Good Luck
anothercrisis

 

FYI, just had 2nd root canal recently, first was ~ 15 years ago and technology has come a long way, root canal isn't as bad as it used to be.

 

Sorry but you need to see the Dentist about this. Clearly warranty related as paint should not come off from daily driving.

 

That's it alright, can see the misalignment with the naked eye.

Yup, that's exactly where this is happening.
Not on the door per se, but just to the rear of it.

You bet it helps!!
Bet Chevrolet knows about it & mine's not an isolated instance.

Question now is, how will Chevrolet deal with the matter?

Thanks ac, this Bud's for you. ;^)

 

I'm starting to notice this, too. It's just behind the doors toward the bottom. I plan to ask the dealer about this.

 

I picked up my C6 in central Alabama 1/15/2006 .It is a Victory Red Convertible. I keep it garaged , towled dry after each wash.Never park near trees.THE PROBLEM .I am having is I can't get the water spots off the clear coat. After a trip to the dealer I was informed by my service advisor the problem seemed to be ACID RAIN.
My question :Have any of you guy's had this problem?
Am I being unreasonable requesting that no sanding or painting be done on a new car. (Iwas told by the S/A that the problem might be fixed by sanding the entire car with 3000 grit.)What about "Deminished
Value".I have had a 1962 and a 2001 both convertibles and never a paint problem.I LOVE the car but I hate these spots .What Do You Think

MADDOG-one McCalla ,Alabama

 

I have an 05 Victory Red, if rain dries on it in the sun it will water spot, even after a few coats of Zaino. The way I removed them was with the Zaino Z-PC Swirl remover.

http://www.zainostore.com/Merchant2/...ory_Code=Zaino

It worked very well for me, took out the spots and did not scratch the paint.

 

My how Zen can you get -- car pollutes, pollution goes into air, comes back as acid rain, eats car. Pollution stops.

 

That's it, Stan.
You neglected to say how many miles you have on your car.
I have around 2,500 and at the rate this "sandblasting" is happening the car's bottom area should be stripped of any & all paint by the time I hit 3,000 miles.
Looks like hell.

Originally I thought it might be due to the width of a Z51's GY "Supercar" tires; but, not every Z51 car with the SC tires reports this happening.
Moreover I have noticed a misalignment of the body panels, just enough to catch fine sand kicked-up by the front tires.
Exactly how this'll be rectified will be something to see, IF it even can be fixed.

Do that Stan, and I'll do likewise.
Afterwards come back to this thread & post your result(s), ie, how GM does or doesn't handle or issues, OK?

Thanks a million for your feedback my friend.
(Time to get on the ol' battle armor, just in case.)

 

I'm having the same prob. Mine is on the front of the door and on the rear 1/4 panel along the door. I put a small strip of clear bra on the door to help it.

 

the later 2006 C-6 have the bumpers installed from the factory to get the door edges out even with the front edges of the quarter panels. i showed the engineers at the C-5/C-6 bash the problem and my fix the rubber bumpers to move the door outward

 

i put flaps on all 3 of my C-5s and i notices the rocker sills would get small stone chips. on my C-6 i installed the 3M clear plastic protection on the trailing edges of the fenders because the flaps did not set well because of the design of the inter fenders. i think now that the flaps cause a air turbulance problems because my C-6 has no chips or marks on the rocker sills of my C-6

 

I've only heard of alleged "acid rain" damage happening in densely populated urban areas around the nation, mainly close to heavy industrial plants.
Do you live in an urban area?
Are any of your immediate neighbors expereincing this or anything similar?

Not on mine, just the abbrasion issue.

A poster listed a product which may be all you need, my friend.
Wetsanding the entire car sounds a bit drastic to me, not to mention quite costly.
Worth checking out other alternatives.

Honestly it sounds to me like your issue is overly-hard water, which when left to dry on its own leaves unsightly water spots that're quite difficult to get off, that's what I think.
It's happened to me.

As for the "theory" of it being acid rain damage?
Sounds [read: smells ] an awful lot like nothing more than the usual PC Liberal-Socialist junk science claptrap we're being inundated with these days.
The Hollywierd whackos love promoting such malarkey in their inane, empty headed programming.
Brainless morons devoid of any semblance of genuine creativity are wont to such behavior(s).
File it right along with the "Global Warming" baloney.

Check out the other possibilities for the spotting & especailly your water (source), OK?
Bet the solution to your issue lies with that more than anything falling outa the air.

 

That's was precisely my first thought.
The "clear bra" material works very well for the front, so why not use it for the areas subjected to this unusual wear?

Perhaps we'll see the aftermarket suppliers provide such a product in the near future, because I'm truly at a loss for a solution to this.

And I do love every single other aspect about the C6 car, it's a bloody shame having to watch helplessly while this happens.

 

How is this done, clem?
Do you know if this can be accomplished on existing cars?
Mine was built in November of 2005, so what exactly constitutes a "later year" 2006 is somewhat enigmatic, or at least, undefined.

Never experienced anything even close to that on my 2003 AE, and that's the truth.

Now that's one fascinating, and plausable, theory my friend.
Worthy of further consideration.

If removal of the front flaps eliminated the issue, that'd be almost too easy.
Thanks for your thoughtful insight on this matter.

 

over on www.digitalcorvettes.com website they showed a picture of a new red vert and with the door open you could see the bumpers

 

Lousy thin clearcoat = GM responsibility
Acid rain = natures responsibility
Which one do you think GM will pick?

 

After reading this post, I went down to check my `06 Z51 paint behind the doors. Indeed I have some paint abrasion too in that area. The bottom edges of my doors are about 1/16" - 1/8" inward of the quarter panel, exposing the area behind.

I have about 2,800 miles or so on the car, most of those miles on roads with lots of sand, stones, pebbles, etc. I drove all winter long. (Yes, I have Pipedream's splashguards installed!!! )

Because my car is silver, the paint abrasion is almost completely unnoticeable unless you put your face right up to it. Regardless, I'd consider this minor as well as "normal". It's a car, meant to be driven, it is going to collect assorted chips, scratches, etc... I would not expect otherwise. Your's may be worse than mine though.

With respect to adding a bumper behind the section of the door that is slightly misaligned... I think I read somewhere that someone, maybe even a GM source, warned to not do this because the bottom edge of the door can crack. Not sure if this is correct info, but I do remember reading it somewhere. So I'd be careful about adding a bumper that might potentially be pushing TOO hard on the door edge. If it cracks, you'll be a lot unhappier than you are now.

I do believe that the Z51 tires tend to throw sand / pebbles etc more than other tires. I've never driven a car that could throw more sand. Sometimes going around turns I hear pebbles hitting the side view mirrors and I can see pebbles flying through the air, etc. The engine compartment is always filled with sand... I mean a ton of it. etc. I think the tires have something to do with all this. Even when I park after driving on sand, you can see the surfaces of the tires fully coated with sand... the sand sticks to them like glue. I do not recall seeing this happen with most other tires.

My personal opinion / recommendation... accept the paint abrasion as somewhat "normal" wear and tear. It is a performance road car, and this is what can happen when you drive one. I would think that all GM would do is attempt to align the door edges a little better.. and if they do, hopefully they do not do something that will crack the doors. If the car has to be painted at all, it'll never look right... so avoid repainting anything at all costs. Not sure what else GM would / could do for you. But again, my abrasion may be a lot less than yours and thus why I feel it is not a problem.

When I crouch down and put my eyes right in front of that area behind the doors, I can see what looks like small pits in the paint, and can see what appears to be light gray primer in those pits. Again, to me this is extremely minor and normal. I also have more noticeable abrasion on the painted areas inside the fender wells that are not covered by the splashguards. What can I say, I like to drive it .

Another good reason to get silver... it hides paint abrasion.