manphibian Posted August 4, 2011 Share Posted August 4, 2011 Anybody had this clear paint protection film applied? Any good? Been quoted £150 to get the front bumper wrapped.... Good price? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rtbiscuit Posted August 4, 2011 Share Posted August 4, 2011 Not used it but i can get hold of the stuff for you if you wanted to do it yourself. £150 for wrapping a front bumper seems reasonable and about right. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
manphibian Posted August 4, 2011 Author Share Posted August 4, 2011 Not used it but i can get hold of the stuff for you if you wanted to do it yourself. £150 for wrapping a front bumper seems reasonable and about right. I would almost certainly make a massive pig's ear of it Hmmm. Might go for it then.... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wasso Posted August 4, 2011 Share Posted August 4, 2011 I'm going for that stuff I believe when I next visit RT Performance for my paint correction. I'd be glad of some sort of protection my front bumper is once again a dot to dot canvas!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
coldel Posted August 4, 2011 Share Posted August 4, 2011 Taras mentioned that if and when they get the front bumper replica done he would offer it with this cover, good idea me thinks to put some protection on it if you are going to fork out for a nice front end. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TomS Posted August 5, 2011 Share Posted August 5, 2011 Definitely going to be getting this done if I go for a respray over wrap. Front bumper is littered with stone chips! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Squee Posted August 5, 2011 Share Posted August 5, 2011 A friend of mine can get me 'mates rates' on something similar called VentureShield which I'm considering once I get the bonnet - anyone know how this compares to the Hexis stuff the OP mentioned? S. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ersen.o Posted August 5, 2011 Share Posted August 5, 2011 will it stop the stone chips? or just lessen them? as im having my v2 kit done in the next few months Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ricey Posted August 5, 2011 Share Posted August 5, 2011 will it stop the stone chips? or just lessen them? as im having my v2 kit done in the next few months Nothing can stop them for good......if a whacking great rock pings up at the bumper then its going to mark it....small chips it should stop though - just make sure the film doesn't get scratched or it'll look a right bollox. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SteveRS Posted August 5, 2011 Share Posted August 5, 2011 will it stop the stone chips? or just lessen them? as im having my v2 kit done in the next few months Nothing can stop them for good......if a whacking great rock pings up at the bumper then its going to mark it....small chips it should stop though - just make sure the film doesn't get scratched or it'll look a right bollox. I've asked Taras at RT-Performance about having this film put on the front end of my zed, after all he has just resprayed the whole car for me so i dont want to get stone chips as soon as i leave the spray shop. Taras emailed me some information about the Hexis wrap, and it protects against stone chips, small scratches, vandalism, 3-4 years durability. You can also still clean and polish your car in the same way as you normally would. Im just waiting on a price from Taras, but this is something im seriously considering having done. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
waltzinblack Posted August 5, 2011 Share Posted August 5, 2011 Used to help out a mate who install this, and he will be doing my Zed as soon as it gets out of the bodyshop! I don't understand why more people don't have it done, but I think it's because there are so many rumours floating about concerning it. What was said above is correct, it stops nearly all small stone chips, and they don't usually mark the film either, because obviously it is plastic and can absorb the impact and flex back out again. Apparently they were originally designed it to protect helicopter blades, and when the guy I know used to run his own business doing it, he frequently applied it to planes and boats as well as supercars. It does also stop people keying your car.. and doesn't lift or discolour in sunlight or heat. Only on a white car that was left in the sun every day for a year might you notice some very slight discolouring. It does also last a good few years, with maybe only a couple of corners needing touchups. The standard kits are usually done by CAD, and put through a computerised cutting machine, so most of the time the kits come prepared and cut to fit. They aren't universal, they are tailored to the car, and only occasionally will they have to be cut ON the car. But such is the protective ability of the film that cutting on the car does not get through to the paintwork. It is done very carefully by hand. Standard kit when I worked with him was (roughly.. depending on car) front bumper, half bonnet, wingmirrors, headlights, front wings (sometimes full, sometimes half wings, depends on car) and some little bits around the wheelarches. I would say for that you would be looking at roughly £400, again depending on the car. A full cover for the whole car could be around £1500, which is still about half what you're looking at for a full respray! The film IS almost invisible. Only on REALLY close inspection can you see a tiny, tiny thin line around the panel edges, but from more than a foot away I would say you could not notice. The half bonnet kits are the only ones that give it away, you can hardly see the actual line of the film, but the light reflects differently off of the film and the bare bonnet halves. My guy always used 3M film, and I believe he now works for VentureShield, and I'm pretty sure they use 3M as well. It's such a good investment - after 3 or 4 years there will be a lot less noticeable chips and scratches, as the film resists so much more than the paint will. You might still have the odd one or two, but nothing is perfect! And if you have the standard front kits (research has shown that these cover the areas that are SO much more likely to be affected) then you could have the film reapplied 5 times before you'd spent the cost of a full respray (unless you just sprayed the front and risked colour not matching). It's also a good selling point, and if the film is in bad nick when it's time to sell, it is removed fairly easily and you can sell your 5 year old car with factory gleaming paintwork! I also wouldn't advise trying to fit it yourself. It requires preparation to get rid of ALL dust before the adhesive and film are applied. It takes a LOT of skill and time to fit the film accurately and correctly, and to cut any excess carefully. You might think it's just putting a big sticker on, but there's more to it than that! I tried doing a wingmirror on a Murcielago and it took me a good hour to get it anywhere near the standard that my mate had done the whole front end with. And he still came over and finished it off to make it perfect! If you are a perfectionist and are patient, then you might be OK. haha. I hope my experiences with this have been useful to any of you considering it! When I get my car done I will speak more in detail to my mate about every step of the process, and will take lots of pics and make a nice thread for you all! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Squee Posted August 6, 2011 Share Posted August 6, 2011 Thanks Waltzinblack, some great info there. This might be a daft question, so apologies in advance, but why only do half a bonnet? Cheers! S Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
coldel Posted August 6, 2011 Share Posted August 6, 2011 Looking at my car the majority of chips are at the front end of it, not at the back near the windscreen. Guessing that is the reason? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Squee Posted August 6, 2011 Share Posted August 6, 2011 Looking at my car the majority of chips are at the front end of it, not at the back near the windscreen. Guessing that is the reason? Makes sense but I can't be the only one that doesn't like the thought of only half a bonnet done as you'd think, and which Waltzinblack confirms, that you'd get a visable line on the bonnet where the vinyl stops. I can't imagine the cost of the extra vinyl being an issue and I wouldn't have thought it was too much extra work for the fitter to cover the whole bonnet but could be wrong I guess! S. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SteveRS Posted August 6, 2011 Share Posted August 6, 2011 I would have the whole of the bonnet done, and the front bumper. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
waltzinblack Posted August 6, 2011 Share Posted August 6, 2011 The reason you only have half the bonnet done, is that tests have shown that a very high proportion of stonechips only ever hit the front half and below. I just had my bonnet resprayed, it had 60k miles worth of chips, and not one chip was past the halfway point on the bonnet. Below that there were loads! I think its because the bonnet stops curving up so much and starts to bend ever so slightly flatter in profile with the car. They also usually only do half the wings, sort of going across the line where the top of the headlights are. This pic makes it a bit more obvious: The main reasons to not have the whole bonnet and wings done are: -Cost.. would probably be just over double that standard kit as extra large sheets of material are needed to cut one whole bonnet/wing piece. -Not really needed.. most vulnerable areas are in yellow in that diagram. -Harder to cut and fit for the installer. Big pieces are hard to do, but are obviously better because you want as few joins/edges as possible. As I said, unless you look VERY closely, even with the standard kit that only does half the front as on that Porsche, it's very hard to tell the film is there. The actual line isn't what you notice - it's the light reflecting slightly differently through the film! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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