Heard back from insurance on claiming diminished value, as expected by state law I'm SOL on that. So if I want to trade the car I have no choice but to eat that loss. Figures. Can't claim diminished value against your own (first party) insurance company in this state. Can only claim against third party companies (i.e. someone hits me and it's their fault, I can seek diminished value from their insurance company).

 

Go after the apartment complex for that!

 

God I don't know if it's worth the hassle to get ~$3k + legal fees. Probably not. I know they aren't responsible for damage or theft, so it'd probably be pretty open and shut with me stuck with the legal fees.

 

Got the car back today.

So far, from what I can see (will look more in different lighting etc):

Paint match: perfect
Metallic flake: perfect
Panel alignment: same as before (no complaints)
Orange peel: just a tiny bit more than I'd like on the front bumper
Clearcoat: some light buffer trails/holograms

Also the car drives just as great as before.

Overall pretty happy with it. The buffer trails are really light and I should be able to get them out myself with just a fine polish - they are certainly better than what another shop left me to work with on my wife's Beetle when she backed into a pole and I was able to correct that myself no problem. I was fully expecting to have to do a light buff, which thankfully appears to be the only thing I need to do. Should have it tip top in an afternoon's time it seems.

Also have my Michelin Pilot Sport A/S 3 tires on for winter, had the lower honeycomb grille replaced since it had that cut honeycomb from the factory for the block plug heater, and even cheated on my awesome PDR guy to have them take out an ever so tiny stamping imperfection on the trunk lid that was there when it came off the truck (figured it was easy enough that I wouldn't need to take a morning off work to go have my usual guy do it and this shop could do it while it was in). Also one of the wheels the thieves stole is the only wheel that had a rock chip (lol joke's on them) so now all four wheels are pristine again.

Overall I would use this shop again. Car is dirty as they did not wash it per my request, so I will give it an ultra gentle wash in the next few days. Will also try to get it out on a cloudy day and comb over it again, it's sunny today and it looks pretty good in the sun. Shop did a fantastic job working with my pain in the *** self with all my special requests. Would recommend.

More than anything just glad to see it on its wheels again. Felt great to drive it.

 

Glad you have it back. The new tires look good. Are they 255/40s too?

Now lower that thing and make it harder to get a jack under!

 

I own a SGM 14' and the pic of your Stang on tires made me sick to my gut! I work 70+ hrs a week to pay for my life style and that includes all my cars. It drives me to drooling mad when i find a door ding on my baby's! My heart goes out to you, i am happy to see that you have fixed the issues. Happy burn outs brotha!!

 

Very nice to see it back on 4 wheels and looking sharp. Very glad this all worked out for you. My heart was with you, I would have been sick and mad as h*** (as you were) if that was mine. Pretty rough to have this happen on a 6 month old car. Best of luck going forward. Looks like you have lock luggs on there now.

 

You parked in spot 69

 

Looks great!! Now forget about the past and go enjoy it!!

 

Congrats! Now keep that new parking location a mystery to all!!!

 

Hey guys, one small question/concern. One thing I absolutely love about the headlights/fog lights (I always have both on at night, never been flashed) is how they throw so much light, and specifically how they illuminate every sign all the way down the road for like a mile.

I had the car out last night and it doesn't seem like this is quite the case anymore. Some signs both overhead and on the side of the freeway got lit up, but others didn't really at all, making them hard to read on a dark freeway. Before I picked the car up when they had the front bumper off I did ask if they were needing to touch the headlights for anything and he said no, but I wonder if one of the techs might have accidentally turned an adjustment screw on a xenon (maybe the right one) mistaking it for something for the bumper. Also I feel like the fogs project about 20-25 feet in front of the car, not 30-35 feet like before. I know there's a vertical adjustment for those, but I'm assuming technically those shouldn't have needed to be adjusted when the car was taken apart/put back together? Maybe they weren't touched but the car went back together ever so slightly different, just enough to make it seem like the adjustment screws are turned down a rotation or two?

Does the right xenon look low to you in these pics? They looked fine to me at first but I'm wondering if the right one is a tad low now. First pic is from about 20 feet, second pic is about 5-8 feet.

 

No that looks normal to me...

 

Sorry. Looks fine to me.

 

That's because those huge lights way up high in the grill on a Mustang are not fog lights. They're driving lights. For forward projection down the road on a clear night.
Fog lights are low. That's how they cut under the fog (fog is a cloud at ground level) to at least give you some (close in) light on the pavement.

 

Yep!

 

So I think the headlights/foglights are fine. I had the car out again last night, but this time on a freeway I usually drive on, and all the signs were lit up like a Christmas tree. The road I was on the other night was a road I don't normally go on, so maybe it was just that road. I also looked at some pics from before with the fog lights on and I think they are throwing the light just as far as they did before, so I think we are good here and no adjustment is needed.

 

Nope, they are indeed fog lights. They are mounted too high from the factory, but they are indeed fog lights. They don't have the right beam pattern for a driving light. These have a fog light beam pattern. Short and wide. A driving beam pattern is more like a high beam. Also, driving lights are only to be on with the high beams for distance vision.

 

im very happy you got your car back..

some people arent as lucky as you though..look what this guy has to go through..yes those were the optional svt appearance bead wheels. $1300 ea. in canada.

 

ermm, i was lucky? i see a truck on jacks missing wheels with no cosmetic damage, looks like hes the "lucky" one...

 

5200 CDN worth of wheels, plus tires, plus lugs.

About the same amount of luck, seems.

Also, those rear jack stands don't seem to be in a good place to me... and them fronts are also kinda odd looking in placement... we sure on the 'no damage' bit?