Everything from your first push to running your own shop. New to dent repair? Start with Reading the board and The repair loop, then let the training course do the rest.
01Getting started
From the main menu you can start or continue a career, open Training, jump into Free play, or change Options.
Careers. Each career is its own save with its own name, money, tools and shop. You can keep several side by side.
Game mode. Every career is played in Arcade or Realistic, and the mode applies everywhere, lessons included.
Training. Three chapters of lessons: the tools, the materials and the dents. A great first stop even if you know PDR.
Free play. Endless practice dents with no clock, no customer and no bills.
Arcade
The metal gets a helping hand when you push in the right direction. Ideal for learning and for a relaxing session.
Realistic
No assists. Nothing but your eyes and your tools, and every overpush is on you.
02Reading the board
The line board is a striped light. Its stripes reflect in the glossy paint, and any change in the panel's shape bends them. That pattern is the main skill of the game.
HighStripes push out around it. Tap it down.LowStripes pull in toward it. Push it up.Deep lowThe reflection folds into rings. Start at the edges.
Lows pull the lines in. The deeper the low, the tighter the pinch.
Highs push the lines out. Usually a sign you pushed too far in one spot.
Rings mean depth. A deep dent swirls the reflection. Each ring that disappears is progress.
Straight, evenly spaced lines mean a flat panel. That's what the customer pays for.
Can't see the stripes well? In Options you can change the line board color (warm white, cool white, amber, green or cyan) and the stripe width.
03The repair loop
Read the board
Choose your tool
Push
Check
Push again
Knock down highs
Hold the main button to apply the tool, and let go to stop. Prefer clicking once to start and once to stop? Turn on click-to-toggle pushing in Options.
Order of work
Edges before the center. Release the outside of the dent first, then work inward.
Small pushes. Many light pushes beat one big one. The metal only keeps what goes past its limit.
Check often. Stop and read the board between pushes.
Knock down your highs as soon as you see them, before they grow.
What can go wrong
High spot: you pushed past flat. Knock it down.
Stretched metal: too much force in one place.
Cracked paint: pushing too hard or too fast, especially on cold paint. It shows in your grade and pay.
04Tools
Rods
Push from behind the panel. You control the pressure. The workhorse of PDR.
Knockdown
Taps down the highs. Light, precise strikes. The harder the tap, the bigger the move.
Heat gun
Warms cold paint so it flexes instead of cracking, and softens plastic bumpers so they'll move.
Trim tools
Remove trim and clips to get access to the back of the dent.
Glue pulling
When you can't reach the back of the dent, pull it from the front:
Clean the panel so the glue can grab.
Glue the tab and set it in the low.
Let it cure. Pull too early and the tab pops off.
Pull with the mini lifter for control or the slide hammer for force.
Release the tab with isopropyl.
Tool quality and wear
Tools come in budget, pro and master versions. Better tools are more precise. In a career, tools wear as you use them: a worn rod is weaker and wobblier, a worn knockdown scatters its strikes. A warning icon on the tool means it's time for a service.
Service your tools in the shop's Tools tab before they drop too low. You can also sell tools you no longer use for half price.
05Materials and panels
Material
How it behaves
What to do
Mild steel
Forgiving. Holds a push well.
The best place to learn your timing.
High-strength steel
Stiffer and springier.
More force, more patience. Expect it to fight back.
Aluminum
Overpushes easily, little room for error.
Small pushes, check after every one.
Plastic
Bumpers barely move when cold.
Heat it with the heat gun first.
Panels and damage
Jobs come on doors, roofs, hoods, fenders and bumpers, in every paint color. Damage ranges from door dings and creases to large soft dents and hail. Dents on a body line or behind a brace are stiffer and harder to move.
Conditions
Career jobs come with the conditions of your shop: cold mornings make paint easier to crack, flickering lights make the board harder to read. Training and free play always use calm, room-temperature conditions.
06Training and free play
The training course has three chapters: the tools, the materials and the dents. Every lesson is a real repair on the bench with a goal to reach.
Show me: stuck on a lesson? Press it and a technician demonstrates the move on the same dent.
Restart this dent from the pause menu if a lesson gets away from you.
Free play: practice any dent as often as you like. No clock, no customer, no tool wear.
07Career
You start in a home garage with a budget kit, flickering lights and a cold floor. The goal: a shop of your own.
Jobs
Pick jobs from the job board or turn them down. Each shows the panel, the damage and the offer.
Beat the clock and get paid for the quality of your work. Your grade decides the pay.
Customers differ: picky owners tip for perfection; cheap ones haggle.
Walking out of a job from the pause menu means you don't get paid for it.
Money
Rent and bills come due on a regular schedule.
You can go into the red for a while, and the shop warns you when you do.
If the debt grows past $1,000 on a bill day, the shop closes down. Start again keeps your name, mode and finished lessons.
Growing
Upgrade to pro and master tools, keep them serviced, and move into bigger, better shops as your reputation grows.
08Decorating your shop
Open the shop's Decorate tab and choose Open the layout editor. The shop you decorate is the shop you work in.
Buy and place
Buy & place or Place puts the item on your pointer. Click to drop it; press Esc to send it back to your inventory.
Items snap to the floor, walls or ceiling, depending on what they are.
An item turns red when it overlaps something. Small overlaps are allowed, but nothing can leave the work area.
Selling a placed item from the inspector gives back half its price.
Editor controls
Action
Keyboard & mouse
Select
Click an item
Move
Drag, or nudge with the arrow keys / WASD
Grid step
[] (0.01 to 1 m) or the toolbar
Rotate
QE, or hold R + mouse wheel. Angle snap 1°, 10°, 90° or free
Raise / lower
Hold Shift + mouse wheel
Duplicate
Ctrl + D
Back to inventory
Del
Undo / redo
Ctrl + Z / Ctrl + Y
Finish
Done saves. Cancel reverts the layout (purchases are kept in your inventory).
The ? button in the editor shows these controls in game.
Epoxy floors
Click a floor slab (or open the Floors tab), pick a finish (matte, semi-gloss, gloss or metallic flake) and a color, preview it, then paint. Price depends on the slab's size and the finish. Recoloring on the same finish only needs a top coat, so it costs less. Strip to bare returns the concrete.
Props that work
LED strips fix the flickering lights.
A space heater fights the cold.
Lamps brighten the room and the board a little.
Any line board you've placed can be set as your working board with Use as working board. Fine stripes show small waves; wide ones read big lows.
09Options and accessibility
Setting
What it does
UI size
Scales the interface from 0.8× to 1.6×.
Line board color
Warm white, cool white, amber, green or cyan stripes.
Stripe width
From 0.6× to 2.5× the default.
Click-to-toggle pushing
Click once to start applying a tool, again to stop, instead of holding.
Rumble
On or off.
Volume
Sound effects level.
Language
Appears when more than one language is installed.
Pause menu
Press Esc during a repair: Resume, Restart this dent (training and free play), Options, Leave the job or Back to the shop, and Main menu.
10Hall of Fame and sharing
The Hall of Fame on pdrsimulator.com ranks shops on two boards. You'll find the same boards in the game under Top shops.
Overall repair score
The average score across every repair a shop has done. A shop needs at least 50 repairs to appear, so consistency beats one lucky dent.
Richest shop
The cash a career has earned. If you run several careers, you're ranked by your best shop.
Private until you share
Nothing about your shop is public until you choose. On the Top shops page you can share, separately:
Scores: your shop appears on the boards.
Garage: players can Visit your decorated garage from the top-10 rows and look around.
Public profile page: your name on the Hall of Fame links to your own page on pdrsimulator.com.
Switch any of them off again and the change reaches the site the next time the game is online.
Want to climb the overall board? Quality on every job matters more than speed: one rushed repair with cracked paint pulls your average down for a long time.
11Help and saves
Saves are stored on your PC, one file per career, and written automatically. On Windows they live in the game's folder under %USERPROFILE%\AppData\LocalLow, in a careers subfolder.
Online backup. When you're online, the game also keeps a backup of each career on pdrsimulator.com. If you lose a save or move to a new PC, use Restore from pdrsimulator.com on the Load page.
Running slowly? Lower the graphics quality in Options.
Text too small or crowded? Adjust the UI size in Options.
Found a bug or have feedback? Write to us. Working PDR techs: your notes on what feels wrong are especially welcome.
PDR Simulator is a game. It's great practice for reading the board and thinking through a repair, but it doesn't replace hands-on training with real tools on real panels.