Cause of paint damage?

[12clover]

Anyone know what the cause of this paint damage could be? It’s on a prospective purchase, hence would be nice to know… thanks.

[Nickp82]

Bird st I reckon

[paradigital]

Looks surprisingly similar to the damage one of my cars sustained when an approaching car hit my offside wing mirror and the glass popped out, only held on by the heated element wiring. Took me a minute to find somewhere safe to stop, by which point the mirror glass had smacked the door randomly in the rushing air over and over, causing damage like you see there.

Restricted to a small area due to the length and rigidity of the heater element wiring.

[itcaptainslow]

Bird lime or an egg being thrown at the car are my immediate thoughts.

[12clover]

Nickp82 said:

Bird st I reckon

But there seem to be small diagonal “cuts” in the area and it looks like some of these have resulted in tiny flakes lifting off. I didn’t think bird poop, but don’t know hence the Q

[12clover]

paradigital said:

Looks surprisingly similar to the damage one of my cars sustained when an approaching car hit my offside wing mirror and the glass popped out, only held on by the heated element wiring. Took me a minute to find somewhere safe to stop, by which point the mirror glass had smacked the door randomly in the rushing air over and over, causing damage like you see there.

Restricted to a small area due to the length and rigidity of the heater element wiring.

Hmmm. It’s in the middle of the bonnet though…

[5s Alive]

Contact damage from something rough that has been either laid onto or been blown onto or fallen onto the bonnet? Certainly looks cut or chipped rather than etched. If it's only through the clearcoat it should be a relatively simple (but not invisible) touch-up/polish.

[x type]

Bird cr.. and someone has scraped it off by the looks of it
If you look carefully it is a round shape overall typical bird cr..

[MDMA .]

£1k or £100k car? Flat or metallic paint? Would put it into perspective a bit.

[myvision]

They look very similar to a patch on my bonnet which are stone chips it is only one affected area.
I had a repair done on the bumper and the paint guy told me that the paint is exceptionally thin in the affected area of my bonnet. Car is a 2020 BMW330e.

[12clover]

MDMA . said:

£1k or £100k car? Flat or metallic paint? Would put it into perspective a bit.

Flat paint - £10k car 4 years old

[Geertsen]

The drivers seatbelt on my car sometimes doesn’t retract when I get out. It hit the rear panel once and the metal edge caused this chip. It looks quite similar with the straight ‘cuts’ by the chips.

Alternatively it could just be stone chips. Sometimes the aerodynamics can send them to one place.

[gweaver]

itcaptainslow said:

Bird lime or an egg being thrown at the car are my immediate thoughts.

Agreed. I suspect egg.

[Easternlight]

Looks like physical damage to me, chipped by something, but in the middle of the bonnet, no idea what

[paintman]

Hen's eggs with their thick shells can cause a surprising amount of damage.
Often appear as concentric circles as the shell collapses progressively on impact & sharp edges dig into the paint.
Chips & gouges similar to those in the OP's pics.
Often too deep to polish out, too many to try touching in & to repair properly usually a panel respray.

Common around Halloween with the 'trick or treat' nonsense & I suspect those throwing them are entirely unaware of just how much damage they can cause & think it's just a harmless messy jape.

Examples:
https://www.autogeekonline.net/forum/how-to-articl...
https://www.mustang6g.com/forums/threads/car-got-e...

[PlywoodPascal]

12clover said:

Anyone know what the cause of this paint damage could be? It’s on a prospective purchase, hence would be nice to know… thanks.

I am sorry to say, based on forensic examination of the impact pattern, that I believe your potential purchase to have been involved in a collision with a cat.

[BenS94]

Buy a £10 matching paint pen, borrow a hair dryer and a very fine emery board or 1200 grit wet and dry plus t-cut. An hour spread over 2 days would see it like new.