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Awesome write-up! I was wanting to do this 7 years ago..... I never got around to it. I just picked up an AP1 for my track car that needs to be wrapped!
Made it through a track weekend, doesn't look as clean anymore, we'll see how easily vinyl cleans up next.
As for the front lip with all the scraping, the vinyl is actually doing really well, as good as I could hope. Got it home, looks like this:
If you just take your fingers and rub along the flake parts, they come right off. I purposefully didn't do any stretching here so I wouldn't have to worry about pull-back after the vinyl got scraped up, looks like the plan worked, but we'll see if it holds up long term. The edges that remain seem to be holding up great, so I doubt I will be painting the lip. I'll just be removing the flakes since they look silly, but, other than that, glad it worked out. Might still have to patch it after a few months, but we'll see.
Originally Posted by liquidtek
I'm about to redo the wrap on mine. I've had it on for about 4 years. Car is garaged but is daily driven thru the winter ect. The vinyl in the rear section is not holding up at all and looks far worse than the rest of the vinyl on the car. Colorado winters ftl.
4 years sounds like you made it quite a while, you must have done a really great job with it! I *really* doubt my job would last 4 years. Was it your first wrap?
Originally Posted by licelsior
Front bumper has taken some abuse through the past winter and i havent had a chance to rewrap it yet. CR lip is the most recent addition to the bumper.
Looks great, and very glossy, I wouldn't even know that was a wrap. Beautiful. Where'd you get the CR lip?
Originally Posted by jugger23
That's an awesome job... impressive.
Nice job!!!
Thanks!
Originally Posted by pastoli
Awesome write-up! I was wanting to do this 7 years ago..... I never got around to it. I just picked up an AP1 for my track car that needs to be wrapped!
This post was so well timed. I have been looking at doing this too myself and VERY seriously at that. I just have yet to finalize the color. I really want something close to the Laguna Blue. Just can't get what I want. I have the original '00 with Silver/ Red combo so getting a dark enough but not too dark blue has been a challenge.
Hardest thing right now is what to do about my paint. I hope you can better answer the question and I think I know the answer. Front bumper has 50K of hard rock chips miles and a lower edge that hit a asteroid crater pot hole one time and chipped/cracked the hell out of the lower bumper paint. So it's not in the best condition for both bumper and the rear quarter.
HOW MUCH WILL it show thought? I guess it all depends on how thin and shiny the vinyl is. I am really thinking of going with a Matte Metallic Blue.
So long story short I think I kind of have to sand/primer/paint the bumper and re-paint the rear quarter. Been looking at doing a DIY but I want it to look decent and not just total rattle can.....Though the rattle cans have gotten PRETTY GOOD from what I have seen. I have contemplated just spraying what I have bought and see how far it goes. Though the deeper ME says don't jerk around and get a decent spray gun and do it RIGHT. Just sucks because I am just going to cover it all up with wrap!
This post was so well timed. I have been looking at doing this too myself and VERY seriously at that. I just have yet to finalize the color. I really want something close to the Laguna Blue. Just can't get what I want. I have the original '00 with Silver/ Red combo so getting a dark enough but not too dark blue has been a challenge.
Hardest thing right now is what to do about my paint. I hope you can better answer the question and I think I know the answer. Front bumper has 50K of hard rock chips miles and a lower edge that hit a asteroid crater pot hole one time and chipped/cracked the hell out of the lower bumper paint. So it's not in the best condition for both bumper and the rear quarter.
HOW MUCH WILL it show thought? I guess it all depends on how thin and shiny the vinyl is. I am really thinking of going with a Matte Metallic Blue.
So long story short I think I kind of have to sand/primer/paint the bumper and re-paint the rear quarter. Been looking at doing a DIY but I want it to look decent and not just total rattle can.....Though the rattle cans have gotten PRETTY GOOD from what I have seen. I have contemplated just spraying what I have bought and see how far it goes. Though the deeper ME says don't jerk around and get a decent spray gun and do it RIGHT. Just sucks because I am just going to cover it all up with wrap!
My S2K is at 99K miles ATM, and the last 25K miles have been purely track and to/from the track, never with a bra or any protection. PERSONALLY, if I were you, I wouldn't paint to get rid of rock chips, I just don't think it's worth the trouble, but my goal with the wrap was just to be "good enough." I really only actually notice maybe one or two of the larger chips through the vinyl. The vinyl wrap seems to have hidden quite a bit of the flaws, which is odd since everywhere I looked told me it would only accentuate flaws. You are right though, it does depend what sort of finish and thickness the film is. I used a satin, so between gloss and matte. If you wanted gloss, or worse...chrome... then you'd want things to be PERFECT I think. The closer to matte you get, the more easy the wrap job will be in general.
If you go the paint/sand route before wrapping, I've done that as well on another car. The real measure of success in a paint job has nothing to do with whether you use a rattle can or a spray gun... especially if you're just going to wrap over it. The big thing with painting, as you probably know, is alllllllllll about sanding. Get a nice electric sander, and prepare to spend hours sanding with very fine paper.
The bumper, unfortunately, is such a large and challenging part that you wouldn't want to do the whole thing just to find that you want to paint the bumper... but you can buy a scrap piece and put it over a bad area on your paint and see what you think. For handling the bumper that is cracked, I really don't know about that. The last thing you'd want is for that crack to flex, so if the crack goes to an edge, you had better fix it. If the crack flexed out, then back in, it'd stretch the vinyl and could leave a ripple in the vinyl, looking horrendous, you'd probably want to make sure you fix the cracks / bondo them.
I don't think you can go wrong painting and sanding, I just don't think I have the patience for sanding such a large piece, knowing I will just wrap over it. All that said, I am a total body novice. Just wrapped a car once :P ... so take it all with some salt.
All good points. I think I finally found the color I will be going with. I am just not 100% if I will do the Matte or the Gloss finish.
Awesome, good luck with whatever you go with! I came across a lot of information that suggests the closer you get to chrome/shiny, the harder the job will be, so matte would be easier than a gloss finish. IIRC, it's due to how well the vinyl can stretch and still have a uniform looking finish. Something to look into at least.
10-08-2017, 06:57 AM
