PPF regrets?

[Jhenson29]

That's just plain dumb.Sorry.

I accept your apology.

Sponsored

 

[DGW]

I have got both Xpel PPF and coating, absolutely happy with it!
Protecting the car the way it should and making cash wash so much easier.
Go for it!

 

[Guards Red Car]

I have read many of the forums devoted to PPF and have watched many You Tube installations...
The topic that rarely comes up is all of the disassembly that is required to correctly apply the PPF film ..... is anybody concerned about all of the removal and reinstallaton of the various marker lights, door handles, mirrors and emblems?
I worry about all of the things that can go wrong with all of this required body work!!

This is my only apprehension about getting PPF installed on my Taycan

 

[taycantom]

I have read many of the forums devoted to PPF and have watched many You Tube installations...
The topic that rarely comes up is all of the disassembly that is required to correctly apply the PPF film ..... is anybody concerned about all of the removal and reinstallaton of the various marker lights, door handles, mirrors and emblems?
I worry about all of the things that can go wrong with all of this required body work!!

This is my only apprehension about getting PPF installed on my Taycan

That is part of why going with a proven/trusted installer is important. The one I use has worked with many, many Porsches and other high end vehicles, and they did a great job for me on my other cars.

 

[Neptune]

PPF or Ceramic Coating will not give you the same depth and gloss as a good white carbunara wax.

If all you care about is how good the paint looks don't get PPF or Ceramic.

Getting a panel resprayed is cheaper than PPF.

 

[Jhenson29]

Getting a panel resprayed is cheaper than PPF.

Getting “a” panel repainted may be cheaper...but multiple panels multiple times...

My only PPF regrets in the past have been not getting it.

I have full front scheduled on our Taycan. I can’t justify the cost diff vs protection benefit for full car (for myself). I’d probably do full car if it came in around $2k less than it did.

Of course, PPF only protects so much...I’ve had numerous trips to the body shop over things PPF couldn’t do anything about...

 

[BruceF]

Hello @Fedex77 ,


On your original question of PPF regrets...

I have PPF on a Tesla Model 3 performance and my Taycan Turbo - I have a bit of regret having it on my Model 3 as the car is not really worth protecting the paint. A few chips (or even a lot of chips) are not a big deal on that car.

On the Taycan it is a different story. Keeping it looking new is much more important to me. It also will be much more important at resale. I can't see respraying it just for rock chips because I think it would actually lose value being repainted vs having some chips (not to mention the cost of a high quality repaint job).

And so the reason for PPF for me is mainly so I don't have to stress about little things that might happen to it that would bug me but would not make economical sense to fix - and so the car can be "like-new" for me for longer.

To me the biggest debate was do I just PPF the front (that is likely where anything driving related would happen - e.g. having a random gravel truck drop a lot of gravel ahead on the highway rat-tat-tatting off the paint before I could avoid it - which is the most important thing I want to prevent) or do I PPF the whole car. I chose to PPF the whole car and do not regret it - but my garage where I park the car (while having plenty of space around the car) gets a lot of traffic from our kids, our dogs and other family going in and out walking by the car - so I thought it made sense to PPF the whole car.

A couple other reasons to PPF the whole car - if you don't have the power charge port (which I don't and which blocks the vents from the front wheel wells) then there might be more risk of of a rock hitting the side doors via the front wheel well vents. And once the front and the sides are done it is not that much more to do the back (which is also nice in case there is any difference in how the paint looks with the PPF) and the back will of course see some use going in and out of the trunk, etc.

Regarding the discussion on removing parts to put PPF on the car. I would say make sure you trust your PPF installer, they have a solid reputation and you have some good references - and make sure they have experience and feel comfortable with any part they remove. I would avoid pressuring them in any way to take a part off to hide one small seam. At the same time - it is pretty standard to be able to (for example) remove the Porsche Crest from the front or remove the badging from the back to avoid lines around those. My installer specifically said they do not typically remove the door handles or side mirrors on the Taycan - as those parts have more complexity to them.

Also I saw some discussion of ceramic coating over the PPF - I did that but the PPF I had installed was not hydrophobic like the PPF someone else on the thread described. My rational for Ceramic Coating on top of the PPF is to make it much easier to keep clean for the next few years - again to have it look "like new" for as long as possible without a lot of time/effort/cost after the initial PPF & Ceramic Coating install.

And one last note on my experience with the model 3. I had a minor scrape on the side of a lower rocker panel. I needed to get that repainted and having the PPF added extra time and cost - as I had to pick up the car from the body shop, wait for the paint to cure then take it to the PPF installer. I would be fine doing that for the Taycan but I felt for the Model 3 it was overkill but I felt I needed to do it since the rest of the car still had PPF.

 

[Fedex77]

Thanks- that sealed my decision to get the full car PPF. It sounds like getting ceramic on top is up for debate. I'll talk to my installer to see if its really necessary.

 

[Schlossj]

I'm being cautious here because there are a lot of fine people that lose their minds if you question the need for ceramic coat on PPF, so please bear with me. The supercar customization shop where I had my Taycan PPF'd stopped applying ceramic coat to PPF after they switched to their current PPF brand. I'm not going to name the brand of PPF they use now because it may not be the only brand that does not benefit from ceramic coat, and I don't want to come across as pushing a particular brand. I had them ceramic coat an older vehicle of mine that lacks PPF, so they are glad to take my money to apply ceramic coat, but they cannot in good conscience do so when the car has been PPF'd with this film and there is utterly no detectible benefit to adding ceramic coat. If you speak to the installers as I have about how they enjoy their job, they speak of a zen-like experience that makes an 8+ hour day seem like minutes, because they can just zone out in the film and coating application processes. I wouldn't hold it against your shop if they truly believe that deeply religious experience must have tangible benefit, even if it doesn't. But like your best friend who fervently urges you to take homeopathic herbal remedies, they may have all the right intentions while speaking nonsense.

Not really interested in this thread / topic (for the record I did go for front Xpel)...but your prose, grammatical precision, and humor, coupled with your rational, thoughtful, economic argument - while also praising the service industry, made me stop and write this - to say "well done, friend".

 

[jimithing]

I'm the opposite, I only got a Kenzo Ceramic coating and would stick with just that again. Well over 10k miles in, a decent amount on worse roads (gravel, nearly offroading, etc.) than 95% of Taycans will ever see, and zero paint damage.

I'm quite confident most people picking up chips on their car are playing follow the semi. Avoid hanging out around trucks and a ceramic coating is all you need, IMHO.

My daily commute involves driving on I-95 so I can't avoid the semis. My Macan picked up TONS of rock chips. I've done ceramic in the past but never PPF. I'm doing PPF on the front of my Taycan.

 

[XLR82XS]

My daily commute involves driving on I-95 so I can't avoid the semis. My Macan picked up TONS of rock chips. I've done ceramic in the past but never PPF. I'm doing PPF on the front of my Taycan.

Excellent choice. Beneficial for rocker panels/lower doors extended at the rear door "hips" as well.

 

[Klepper]

I will give my dissenting opinion here. Keep in mind, this is just my experience.

I usually trade my vehicles in vs. selling them privately. I don't like dealing with all the hassles of selling privately. Given my situation, I am not sure I ever recoup much of the cost of PPF. I.e. I don't think I get more value on trade-in because I have less paint chips on the car.

Also, this may be amplified because of the potentially higher depreciation on these early cars. As an analogy, I don't think my old iPhone 4 is worth more now because I had a screen protector on it to avoid some scratches.

My $0.02

 

[BruceF]

I will give my dissenting opinion here. Keep in mind, this is just my experience.

I usually trade my vehicles in vs. selling them privately. I don't like dealing with all the hassles of selling privately. Given my situation, I am not sure I ever recoup much of the cost of PPF. I.e. I don't think I get more value on trade-in because I have less paint chips on the car.

Also, this may be amplified because of the potentially higher depreciation on these early cars. As an analogy, I don't think my old iPhone 4 is worth more now because I had a screen protector on it to avoid some scratches.

My $0.02

As someone who earlier in this thread advocated for PPF (at least for myself) - I think you make a good point and I would not disagree.

To me the most important reason to get PPF on a Taycan is for ones own desire to keep the car looking new and not to get your money back on the sell side. If resale (or total cost of ownership) is the primary focus I agree it is not worth it on a Taycan (that even kept brand new will have significant depreciation as new tech comes out).

 

[BayAreaKen]

I have the Xpel Ultimate PPF on my front and sides (up to the rear doors) and am very happy I have. Within a few weeks of owning it, a rock hit my hood and bounced up and hit my windshield, causing a bit of a nick in the glass. The PPF protected the paint on the hood,, as it was supposed to, but I do have a little hole in the PPF that is visible if looking very closely.

Then, something hit my passenger front door when the car was in the shop recently for the software update, and caused a few scrapes significant enough for the dealer to offer to re-cover the whole door. Again, no damage to the paint.

I highly recommend PPF (I’m a first time user of that product).

 

[BTR12]

I'm being cautious here because there are a lot of fine people that lose their minds if you question the need for ceramic coat on PPF, so please bear with me. The supercar customization shop where I had my Taycan PPF'd stopped applying ceramic coat to PPF after they switched to their current PPF brand. I'm not going to name the brand of PPF they use now because it may not be the only brand that does not benefit from ceramic coat, and I don't want to come across as pushing a particular brand. I had them ceramic coat an older vehicle of mine that lacks PPF, so they are glad to take my money to apply ceramic coat, but they cannot in good conscience do so when the car has been PPF'd with this film and there is utterly no detectible benefit to adding ceramic coat. If you speak to the installers as I have about how they enjoy their job, they speak of a zen-like experience that makes an 8+ hour day seem like minutes, because they can just zone out in the film and coating application processes. I wouldn't hold it against your shop if they truly believe that deeply religious experience must have tangible benefit, even if it doesn't. But like your best friend who fervently urges you to take homeopathic herbal remedies, they may have all the right intentions while speaking nonsense.

If you don't mind me asking, what shop did you use? We will pick up a Carmine Red 4S in a few weeks and want to do the full front PPF, but my wife also wants interior protection. We are in Alexandria

Sponsored