If you have chipping on your hatch, you have to have had something hitting your hatch to cause the chipping...

Just to clear this up, because there is a lot of misinformation out there. To make the statement "clearcoats are much harder than paint" is to imply that clearcoat is not paint. Its paint, its the same paint its just clear (or even tinted depending on the color). They do put some additional hardners in clearcoat but it is still just paint.

As to if you painted one car with just the base coat and painted one with a clear the one with the clear would last longer...of course it would, since the base paint is not designed to be applied without the clear.

Modern paints are very different than the solvent/oil based paints used way back when. Those paints held up much better than modern paint, paint was applied much thicker. You could polish, and polish and polish that paint and never burn through.

 

I think 97ES300 was referring to single stage vs. two-stage/clear. I don't think he meant to say "base" coat. He is correct, however, in that clear coated paint job will outlast a single stage paint job by far.

 

Not necessarily, could have just been a **** paint job. But even if it was from a strike of some sort, my 2000 BMW certainly got hit with more stuff over its 12 years and 110k miles parked on the street every night, than the 2007 Lexus did over 6 years and 76k miles parked in the garage every night. So they should have a similar number of chips, but it's not even remotely close.

 

I disagree. The single stage paint job is going to require more maintenance, but lifespan is a separate issue.

For years Lexus used single stage black, for instance. That single stage black paint cleans up beautifully.

Sure, your 2000 BMW was manufactured right before EPA guidelines required carmakers to start using low VOC water based paints. Paint is unfortunately not nearly as robust as it once was.

Can you post some pictures of this chipping on your hatch? I've never seen anything like that, and chipping at the rear would be very strange.

 

I assume this regulation applies to everyone? Why has it disproportionately affected Japanese automakers? Lexus, Subie and Infiniti boards are littered with people whining about soft paint.

 

It applies to everyone.

I don't know that it does disproportionately affect Japanese brands. I'm on a Jeep forum and people ***** about it all the time. I've seen similar comments on the MB forums, BMW forums...