BatmobileX

Hm, my obsidian RX looks good now but is this clear bra thing something I should do now, or is it too late being that the car is already a year old? Where do you get this clear bra?

Or should I just wait til it no longer looks as nice and go for a repaint?

RXSF

It is never too late to get a clear bra. However, if you already have one or two chips on there, then you are putting on a $300+ layer of film on top of something that should prevent chips you already have.

Clear bras range in price and quality. Some installers only install on the front half of the hood. This is obviously cheaper but the issue is that obviously only half of the hood is protected, and second, the line where it ends will be crazy difficult to keep clean, especially if you are waxing. The wax builds up on the divide line. Then you can go full bra but a lot of places have a computer to precut the specific size for your car. Issue here is that you again will have visible seams that will eventually get dirty. And then most expensive of all, you can get a custom job where they will actually wrap the clear bra under the edges of the hood so you cant even tell from the naked eye that you have a clear bra. these cost about $500 for full hood

DarylS2001

IMO..Yes the clear bra protects your paint - but it doesn't necessarily look perfect ..bubbles, lines, etc. I guess I will see how it holds up over time.

MX5NES350

If you have bubbles in the clear bra then the installer wasn't the greatest and it should be fixed o replaced. Find a reputable one through your dealer.

For those who want to see it close-up check my post HERE. It provides angles that show a line and also those that don't.

DunWkg

MX5,

Quoting from one of your photo captions:
I believe paint protective film is both a curse and a blessing. After two years, up close mine looks terrible on the hood. Replacing it is of course an option. Did it protect from rock chips? Yes, because I have chips above it and at the edges of it. Would I use it again? Yes, but I would wrap the edges of the hood and probably do the front bumper. Do the whole car? No chance, as even brand new it does not have the clarity and reflectivity of properly polished paint (on Obsidian Black paint). No one has demonstrated to me a product for PPF that lessens the damage from bugs, ice, or rocks. I can polish out most of such damage on the paint.

As MX5 has stated, "subjective".

(MX5, nice looking paint choice.)

MX5NES350

Thanks, David. Fair assessment. A nice long Pennsylvania winter will give me the final verdict as far as my opinion will go. I know it already helped me (I only had NINETY-SEVER MILES ON IT) when a truck tossed up some cinder ships.. I mean CHIPS

BatmobileX

2 questions on this issue:

1)How about forget about the clear bra and just get the car repainted when it starts looking bad? How much could that cost? Anyone done that? And if so, where?

2)To best protect the paint, how are you guys washing it? Going through a standard car wash with brushes? Brushless car wash? Do it yourself with a sponge? I've been going through a manual car wash where you put in $1.75 and it cycles through several stages and I just do the water blast followed by the soap, then rinse, and wax, I don't even use the scrubber to avoid scratching.

RXSF

Sure you could repaint it for $300+ but you are going to lose the factory finish. An expert car person will be able to tell that the hood had been painted before and this will make it lose value.

You might want to check out the detailing forum for more info. But generally:

Avoid all gas station washes with automatic brushes at all cost. Also avoid hand car washes unless you don't enjoy washing your own car. Obviously these are better than the gas station auto washes, but we have no idea how clean they keep their towels and that will scratch the paint.

What I do is:
1) Rinse the car off with water
2) Use the two bucket method. One bucket full of soapy clean water. The second bucket full of just water. Then I use my microfiber wash mitt. I dont bother putting my hand in there but I just use it as a "sponge." Only use microfiber washing equipment or wool if you dont want scratches. Dont use plain sponges.





3) I avoid circular motions and go in one direction from front to rear of the car. Rinse the microfiber mitt often in the second bucket before putting it back into the clean soapy bucket. The wash mitt itself will not scratch the paint, but dirt on the mitt will!!

4) Rise the car clean.

And if you really have time of if you are really **** like me!



For the inside of your wheel well.

5) dry with microfiber towel

Sorry for hijacking thread subject but this is good info in general

MX5NES350

On question 1: It's expensive since you don't just get the hood repainted, you need the bumper and a blend into the fenders so you don't see as much of the repaint. The cost will also depend on the paint itself - is is plain old black (Obsidian) or is it something which will require more work by the person repaintintg it (i.e. metallic/Stargazer or pearl/Starfire Pearl). These all go into the cost or repaint. As I said in a previous post the repaint of my Starfire Pearl ES; hood bumper and blending, was $2,500.00 to get it to factory specs. Like RXSF says you generally lose value on a repaint since, for the most part, those who are **** like RXSF and I can tell pretty quickly if a vehicle has been re-shot.

On RXSF's suggestions he is spot on for washing. Do not EVER trust the gas station car washes and if you choose to go to one of the car washes that are mini-detailing shops and crank through 15 cars at a time, vacuum, then dry your car by hand be warned those towels they are using on your car have been used on up to three cars prior to yours and when they drop them on the ground they do not put them in the laundry basket. I've witnessed this frist hand... drop the towel on the ground, pick it up, DRY THE HOOD. As a rule of thumb, if my drying cloth (microfier), detailing cloth (microfiber), or let's say ANYTHING that touches the car drops on the ground it goes right into the laundry bucket and I start with a fresh one. They pick up those little bits of stone and that stone gets rubbed on your car. If I am using a calybar and that gets dropped then the claybar goes in the trash.

Hope this helps.

Oh, I forgot to add the 3M Rock Guard also has a layer of clear coat on it. So if it does have a scratch I can use a polish like Meguiar's Scratch-X to bring it back to shiny again.

BatmobileX

I just came from the DIY car wash (I didn't use any brushes, just high pressure blasts of soap, rinse, and wax) and now I see that indeed I do have scratches on my hood! So if you get the clear bra couldn't that scratch also? I'm trying to understand what the benefit is. Is it that scratches are less visible with the clear bra?

InRBigness

the plastic will not scratch unless it is somthing that is very hard and heavy. That being said, the same thing would likely have put a nice gash in your paint. You can see the scratches in the paint because the clear coat is scratched away. The clear bra has some elasticity to it.

You could have your car hood polished and then put on the paint protection. I just got a quote here for $700 to do the whole hood wrapped as well as the fenders and the bumper and mirrors.

RXSF

the clear bra scratches itself too but it takes a lot to do it. Its main purpose is to prevent against chips to the paint, not scratches. The chips come from rocks on the freeway that get picked up and hurled towards your car by other motorists. If you put the clear bra on when the car is new, it also protects the paint from swirls.

Also like paint, the clear bra needs waxing throughout the car, recommended every two weeks. You also need to remove sap and bird poop from it immediately or else it will stain.

kitlz

The clear bra on my RX still looks great after almost two years. Scratches are hard to create and not very noticeable compared to unprotected paint. I use Klasse AIO every few months to clean and protect it. I'll probably do that tomorrow. Time to get the shine back.

Here is a picture of the applicator pad after putting Klasse AIO on the clear bra two months ago. And I clayed first. It picked up the dirt nicely with little effort.