fflores

I picked up my car about 3 weeks ago and have already decided to make fairly large change to the car. One of the first things that I wanted to change on the car was the chrome trim, seems like its a common change for some. In that process I was also going to change the finish of the badges for the F-Sport side badge, the rear "L" badge and the "IS350" badging to black. However after a closer look at the rims which are on the car, they could use a refinishing, looks like someone tried to clean them with brake cleaner and messed up the finish. They also have some curb rash, nothing too crazy but something I would like to try to fix. This got me thinking about maybe purchasing a full spray kit. It just so happen that last week DYC had a pretty good sale going on and so I purchased a full kit.

I have a nebular grey car, I would like to give it a satin finish overall, both for the look and also more practically, if I apply this correctly, it should provide great protection for the existing paint on the car which appears to be great shape. I think I will still black out the trim and badging, but i'm not sure yet until after I see how it looks. I will still dip the rims to a black finish but I have to order the metalizer finish so that it they aren't just a matte black.

I kit I purchased should give me the kind of finish shown in the pics I attached.

Has anyone else wrapped or dipped their cars? How easy or difficult was it? I received the gallons today, but the equipment is slightly delayed so I wont be getting them until Monday which ruin my plans to do it this weekend.

fflores

Early last week I went out to take a few pics of the car prior to any changes, just so that I could track some before and after progress pictures. Not too long afterward taking these pics I went ahead and ordered the kit for dipping the car. The packages arrived on 2 different dates, which make me have to wait a additional week before I could attempt my little project.

fflores

The products finally arrived and I was able to start prepping the car for the new finish. I had been watching so many tutorials that I felt comfortable in starting the process this weekend. I took the time to make the process pretty deliberate so that I wouldn't miss a step or mess anything up. I took most of one afternoon and evening washing the car, I washed the car 2x to ensure that it was clean in the obvious areas, but then also put a lot of attention to some areas like the wheel wells and under all the doors. It seems like under the doors were the dirties place, it took a surprising long time to get all the doors cleaned. The delivered products also came with some car wash solution so I washed the car again with their solution as well. Then after I dried the car off, I applied a pre-dip solution which is suppose to ensure that there is no wax/oils/grease left on the cars surface. Did the car one panel at a time and then let the car sit overnight so that it could complete dry out. So that all the moisture from between the door jams and panel seems can drain.

fflores

Today I spent the day taping and masking the car. After watching some of the tutorials again, I applied the masking per how I have both seen from the tutorials and from previous experience in dipping badges and other applications. It was a pain to deal with, everything that needs to be masked does not have a single straight line on it so it was nothing but making small strips of tape to mask off areas and/or applying news paper or plastic to cover large areas like the windows.

Tomorrow morning I will apply the pre-dip solution again 30 minutes before I start and then I start applying the base coats.

anamynous

Good luck! Can't wait to see the result.

fflores

thanks, got a later start than planned but going to start now

spraytask

Hey, I have the satin finish as well and it loos great. Although I highly recommend going with wrap vs plasti dip on the whole car. When you get tired of it, it's a big big pain in the *** to remove it and can damage the car if not done properly. Good luck!

e60bmw

iTrader: (1)

I have a es300 I dipped in sterling silver. Made some mistakes for my first time last year but looks fine overall. It’s just a lot of work to maintain it.

fflores

On previous cars that I've owned, I had a set of dual stripes on the car, I do recall it being such a pain to remove them when I wanted to change colors, the vinyl had been on for about a year, an came off in little tiny chunks. When I removed the masking off the car yesterday, everything came off pretty well. Though I did make some mistakes in how I planned some aspects of the removal of the overspray areas, but nothing that I couldn't fix with time and effort.

fflores

Yea, I made some mistakes too, but nothing that is too bad. just learning experiences for next time.

fflores

I got finished with the car yesterday and it took quite a long time to get thru the application process. I did the entire thing alone, so it was difficult to deal with the lighting, and the sprayer, the hosing. I have never painted a car or used a spray gun to apply paint before so it was a little concerning during the first part of the application. I did purposely start with light coats at first so that I could have more coats and chances to fix any unevenness or tiger stripping from happening. There was a point about half way thru coat 3 which I got a little nervous about the application and possible result. I did 4 coats of gunmetal and then 4 coats of Anthrocite. It came out a little darker then I thought but I still like it.

After I finished the coats, I then had to deal with stripping down the car and removing the masking. That's where some things went well with removing the over spray, but also some mistakes were also made in how I planned for the removal, but I was able to fix the issues, just took longer then expected.

Finally, the next morning, I applied the after dip care solution, and it completed changed the feeling of the dip. If you are not familiar with dip texture, it is a little rubbery until it cures, but even then it is a little grippy, this dip spray made the dip feel like vinyl, it completely changed its texture, the only side effect is that it darkened the finish a little bit, but not too much.

I was planning on spraying the chrome trim to black, but after seeing it, I think I might just leave it as is, at least for now.

Here some pics of the process

fflores

I have no idea why the pics are appearing side ways or upside down, they are correct on my phone and on the laptop.

arentz07

Looks really cool, well done!

Robsgarage

This looks awesome!

skiracer

Wow not bad for your first attempt!