Finally tinted my car after all these years with llumar ctx 30 and am shocked by the heat rejection. I shoulda done it sooner.

I'm now interested in Llumar Air 80 to use on my windshield, but I've read online that some people reported seeing a grainy texture and disrupted light dispersion after application. Can anyone clarify this? I'd really like to be able to reject the heat out here in the Central Valley of California, but if it is going to affect seeing out of my windshield, it's gonna be a hard pass. I'm wondering if maybe those with negative experiences just had a bad application and are outliers.

 

They are good at what they do but you will get the grainy texture and not so clear vision. Eventually you get use to it and it becomes natural but once you sit in a different car you are all head over heels on the clear sight.

 

Some of y’all got good eyes. initial install will look waving and hazy but after 2-3 day cure, i can’t tell. I have it done on all my cars and definitely worth the heat rejection.

 

Not familiar with Llumar films but we use Suntek in our shop all day everyday. Unfortunately you will get a lil haze or grainy effect when tinting a windshield. Reason being, you have to shrink the film on the outside of the glass before installing on the inside. When you shrink the film it is no longer perfectly flat thus creating the effect you are describing. While it doesn't bother some people at all, it does bother some. I myself look past that since I know what it is and the tint is doing it's job. With an 80% film though you shouldn't have an issue at all. I have 60% on my wife's IS with no issues, 55% on my truck with no issues and 70% on my daughter's Corolla with no issues. But again, I know what the tint is there to do and that is more important to me than the small imperfections you might see.

But, with this all said you do have to be careful with certain films. When you shrink them you can get what is known as "ghosting". Which means everywhere you shrink the film makes like a hazy "ghost like" look in certain light. I can't speak for Llumar but we did use to have that problem when we used some films from Madico and others. But we haven't had that issue lately. The lighter, more reflective films have more of a chance to "ghost" than the darker carbon type films.

 

The particles in the tint from being "ceramic" are what causes the visual fog, not the fact that it's heat shrunk. Otherwise non-ceramics would distort because most tint jobs require shrinking. (I tint cars too--for fun) Tinting my 2021 ES this weekend. Can't wait.

 

You're correct. Some non ceramic films will still "ghost" when shrunk as well. But for the most part it is the "ceramic particles" causing the hazy look. But we haven't experienced that in the lighter films. When you get into the 55% and darker films is when we have noticed it.

 

Huh, so those "ceramic particles" are what I've been noticing on all my windows... I also notice that when I'm wearing my polarized sunglasses, I can see a green/red dot matrix on whichever window tint I'm looking out through. Cool stuff. Helps confirm that I actually did receive ceramic tint.

@E46CT good luck with the window tinting!

 

Yup, that's it.

 

I have installed Air 80 on my moonroof and windshield and CTX 30 all around on my IS 300. It definitely helps with heat rejection. Air 80 is good stuff, but it's old tech. The clarity of Air 80 on the windshield is good, but you will see a rainbow effect in certain angles from the outside, especially with polarized sunglasses.

I recently switched to XPEL Prime XR Plus for my 2020 RC F on all the windows including moonroof and windshield...it makes a huge difference.

 

Curious how is the XPEL do with polarized on front windshield? Needing to make a choice soon and trying to avoid rainbows with Polarized glasses if at all possible lol. Thanks !!

 

I got XR Plus 30 on my Rav and my 350. It does make a huge difference. I have been hesitant getting "clear" tint for the front but that's currently where my energy "loss". Is XR Blue good given some of the opinions of Llumar Air?