If you want to keep the car forever then It makes sense. But if you switch your car every 3 years or so, its not worth it. Why babysitting it for next owner? Its not that a few stone chips will lower the value of the car when you sell it or trade it in. Enjoy it!

 

250 miles, and two chips....at avg of 15k miles a year, for a 3yr lease....thats a lot of rock chips lol.
Obviously it won't attain a chip every 125 miles, but why risk it? Forget about resale value. The owner of the Porsche didn't clear bra it for resale value, he did it to have a car that he was proud to get in and out of every single day.

At the end of the day it all comes down to what you value. If you can spend over a grand on an airbag suspensions, or coilovers,or a body kit, why not spend a grand and protect your cars condition, its resale value (which WILL be affected by paint damage), and most importantly, be proud of what you own?

Edit: Just my two cents. I have no affiliations to clear bra companies lol.

 

I disagree completely. Mines a lease, no way I'm going to have it for more than 3 years. Its not about value, its about always wanting to keep my car in as perfect, like new condition as possible. That was my argument to myself many times when I got a new car and talked myself out of the clearbra, but as the mileage piled up and the chips piled up it would really bug me a lot as I washed and detailed the car as I do often. To me the value is that I don't have to worry about it and its always perfect...

One of the big reasons I did it on the GS is the silver color makes chips look awful and no touchup paint matches worth a damn. On my previous cars which were dark colors the touchups would blend in to where you couldn't see them unless you were looking, but on the GS they absolutely stick out....and cannot be touched up. After a year or so though, the front bumper down low on my previous cars was pretty sandblasted...and thats with me being careful. Don't have to worry about it now. Well worth $800.

 

Looks nice, however maybe I'm biased, cause the plastic doesn't quite give the same shine/reflection...kind of just makes the car look plastic with a nice shine to it.

 

I spent a lot of money putting clear bra on my Acura only to discover the rocks hit where the clear bra ain't and it began to peel around the intricate design swirls where it was more difficult to apply. Yes, it was done by a top rated shop. The kicker is that they didn't offer more money at trade-in because the rest of the car showed wear and tear too. Also, I wish there was a way to clear bra the windshield.

Did touch up on my Genesis. Like Tony said -- I learned to live with it. Of course one can saran wrap the whole car and put front and rear seat covers on too.

 

LMAO...if you saw that car on the street you would never know it had a clear bra on it. Thats just the bottom line

This is the solution, you either do a clearbra or you put up with chips. These cars chip very badly.

Which is why I will do the whole hood next time.

The shop should redo those areas. My installer told me that if anything ever lifts or anything to just bring it back and he would replace the section free of charge.

I wouldn't expect there to be any more money at trade in. Its for my own enjoyment, not trade in value.

 

I value my cars tremendously but I don't believe in the clear bra for the cost, look (at least the partial one), and eventual differences in paint fading. However, and this is a BIG however, I've had very few noticeable chips (handful max) on the front of each car I've owned. This is a combination of avoiding highways as much as possible, dirty/construction-laden roads, and keeping my distance from cars and especially trucks ahead. If I was bombarded by chips, I may have a different outlook out of necessity, but I'd try below first:

So if you've taken all possible preventative measures and high rate of chips still seem to be unavoidable, you have another option besides the pricey full clear bra if you don't mind the "reactive approach". I haven't used it, but some folks at ClubLexus and other folks out there swear by it and this is what I'd buy if my car began to look like the face of the moon:

http://www.drcolorchip.com/?gclid=CK...Fek7MgodsRsAog

Good luck

 

I've tried the DR Color Chip and found it mediocre at best. Their paint match for the Liquid Platinum and the Natural Green on our Jeep was laughably bad, and OEM paint is too thick to use the system with.

The other issue is the Dr Color Chip paint is very thin, and it doesn't hold up in the chip. It also doesn't help with the roughness of a chip, the chip will still be plainly visible, just filled in. It also doesn't work on shallow surface abrasions which is the big problem with Lexus paint on light colors. The slightest touch of a stone will remove the top layer of paint leaving a black mark.

Believe me...I've tried everything.

The paint on our Jeep is much better. It just gets the occasional chip here or there that can be touched up and its no big deal. You don't have all the little scarring like you do on the Lexus. Jeep has no clearbra and doesn't need it IMHO. I've owned a lot of Lexus cars though and the paint is thin and chips easily.

There aren't any...I just Googled it and the responses are questions about fading...but no posts complaining about differences in paint fading.

See...I can't avoid roads, I'm a busy guy and I need to get where I am going...and you can't avoid construction around here its everywehre. I keep my distance, but our highways are VERY high volume with lots of trucks.

I've found I am also much more relaxed about driving the car on the highway now that I have the clearbra, and enjoy it more.

 

@SW13GS

My last car was in silver and I know what you mean about hard to touch up. I asked my Lexus body shop to give me a little bottle of the paint they are using and it matched perfectly.

I drive on the busy highway everyday and now I kind of know what distance to the car in front I should keep to not get the stones on hood and bumper. So now I get them on my windshield instead.

 

You can tell the car is wrapped. It has a plastic shine allover it...

 

At my old job (Porsche specialty race shop) we had cars clear bra'd all the time, and we never noticed a difference in the paint fade. Vinyl wrap is a completely different story. Dark color wraps= tinting of the original paint.

 

Yeah I need to do that. They didn't have the color right after I got the car, I had to drive to a dealer 35 miles away just to get the OEM parts department tube!

All highways aren't created equal, the issue here is that since the highways are so high volume, especially the Beltway and 95, you can't hold back far enough not to be in danger of rock chips, you'll get run over, cut off, etc. The highways are moving at 80 with a car length or less between the cars...

I just had a rock skip off the top of the hood (of course!) and hit the windshield. Scuff on the hood I was able to wetsand to where it isn't horrible looking, and a chip in the windshield above the driver's wiper (no crack). I just ordered an interesting pit filler for the windshield I saw on a MB forum:

http://www.aegistools.com/catalog/Re...Filler-System/

They say it does a great job of filling in noncrack chips. For $25 its worth a shot.

If you saw it on the street you would never know. You're seeing that because you were told it was wrapped. I cannot tell the difference in shine or look between the area of my hood that has the clearbra and the area that doesn't.