Has anyone gotten a clear bra installed on their C63? I have a 2018 with 10k miles that I just purchased and it will be delivered to my home within the next week. My local installer quoted me $1,500 seems like a lot, but maybe it’s worth the price? How often does it need to be replaced?

 

depends on how long you plan to keep it for. I do it for my own peace of mind and i hate rock chips.

 

If you like the paint to look pristine, then it's definitely worth it on a brand new car. On a used car that didn't have it, you should do a paint correction and fix all the rock chips it may already have first. Or you could certainly put one on as-is to keep it from getting worse. Also somewhat depends on the color of the car. Black cars have white primer for example, so chips are very visible. Is that quote for a full front PPF or just partially up the hood? Seems rather low. I have PPF on the full front, everything forward from the A-pillar including headlights, mirrors, door edges and door handle cups and the entire rear bumper. Basically all the high impact areas. I did the same on my previous car and it did its job. Somebody hit my rear bumper in a parking lot and all it damaged was the film. Their insurance paid for replacing the film, but no need to mess with the original paint. I've had something land on my hood as well and the film absorbed it. Newer films are also self-healing. Under the heat of the sun, minor scratches will disappear on their own. I paid somewhere around $4000 for the whole thing done by a certified XPEL installer who does high end cars etc. There are different films. XPEL is one of the self-healing ones, but it's somewhat expensive and you do wanna have it done by a good installer in general, because I've seen some *****y work. The C63 especially has some areas where the film can peel from the tension if not installed properly. The lower corner of the headlights nearest to the grill specifically. You shouldn't have to replace it for many years, unless you have an impact somewhere that damaged the film, just like you would have to otherwise potentially repaint that area of the car. I had my previous car for 7 years and 75k miles. There were some areas where the film was damaged from doing its job, but not to the point where replacing it would have been worth it. I sold the car as-is, so the new owner benefited from the continued protection. It's certainly not cheap, but they do protect the paint as advertised. Some of this also depends where you drive and how much debris usually hits the front of your car. I did European Delivery and drove the car for 2 months and almost 7000 miles in Europe, but the roads are clean over there, so no chips. I had the PPF put on immediately after the car arrived in the USA, because around here rocks flying around is part of the day. Already had to replace a windshield because of it.

 

New Car, YES. If her front end is in good shape (you car), $1500 for full hood, fender, mirror, A pillar and full bumper is a good price. Assuming Xpel or Suntek film.

 

I wish to this day I would have done this to my car I'd say very worth it, although I can't speak to that quoted price.

 

Thanks everyone! Once I get the car delivered I’ll assess the situation, it’s a black car so yeah, I’m definitely leaning towards a clear bra. My local installer uses XPEL and from what I’ve seen have the best reviews around! I’m sure $1,500 is the starting price, but I will do the paint correction if needed first!

 

Picked up my c63 last weekend and it's first stop was my detailer for an xpel and ceramic treatment. I ceramic coated my last car but didn't do the bra and ended up kicking myself for it everytime I looked at it. Got my car back today and it looks great!

 

+1 in the process of looking for a local spot to get my paint corrected and rock chips repaired. Once that’s done, will be taking it straight to get PPF put on.

 

I had my first edition done with Xpel 5 years ago but only for the front 1/3 hood, bumper and mirrors. It was $750 including the paint correction. It seems that Xpel has gone up quite high in price over the years. JUST for the film itself from the Xpel website, I calculated $740 already. That's not even including the labor and paint correction. At the new price points, it doesn't become worth it for me unless I plan to put a lot of miles on the car. It starts to approach the price of a good bumper and hood respray.

 

The problem with a respray is that the front starts looking worse and worse over time, then you do the respray and it all looks good (let's ignore factory paint vs repaint), and then you just start getting rock chips again. With PPF the paint always looks good. Respray is almost a waste of money, because it will only look perfect for a little bit before the first rock hits again.

 

So you don't think the PPF gets worse over time? Ha! I've had 8 cars PPFed over the past 16 years while keeping them up to 100k miles. The PPF, while protecting the paint, is the one that absorbs the stone chip impacts. So it will pit and tear. Once it tears or pits, water and dirt go under it. The adhesive under that portion also discolors with the dirt. Ask me how I know all this? While Xpel has been the best PPF I've had, it's not impervious to problems. So the Xpel (or any other PPF) gets worse over time. Then when you want to remove it (with the thought of replacing it), guess what?! Sometimes it rips the OEM paint off along with it! Note that the installer that I've used is the highest regarded one in the area and has the most experience with Xpel. They always warn you that removing the PPF sometimes rips the paint off (even if they use a heat gun to soften things up).

So again, buyer beware. To me, at the new price point, it's no longer worth it. The last one I had done was our 2017 Volvo XC90 (1/3 hood, bumper, mirrors). It has 45k miles. Our 2014 S5 with 110k miles has the worst PPF.

 

Not my experience, but I live in a dry mild climate. As I said, I kept my last car 7 years and almost 80k miles. Yes, in a few places the film was damaged a bit, but that's only visible right up close compared to a rash of white dots on a black car. Replaced it on two panels due to a couple of minor accidents. No issue with paint ripping of. To some extent that has to do with letting the paint cure enough. With cars produced in Europe that's not as much of an issue as the paint can cure while it's being shipped to the USA. In my case I drove the car 1-2 months in Europe before it received PPF once it arrived here. YMMY, but I prefer looking at pristine paint for as long as I own the car and as much as possible. My previous cars w/o PPF were a rash of white dots on the front, so I'll take the PPF even with the potential risks. There were yellowing issues and such with films in the past, but that's pretty much all history with today's films.

 

I had my 2019 C63s coupe with about 5,000 miles ( Iridium Silver in pristine condition) installed with XPEL by an authorized dealer.
Soon after the install I noticed many blemishes and distortions throughout the hood and front fenders. (below photos). This occured only while wearing polarized sunglasses and on sunny days. Take the sunglasses off and everything looked fine. I drove over to the XPEL installer who stated he was unaware of this. But once he put on polarized sunglasses he saw the blemishes and distortions. He realized re-doing was not going to correct it. On the XPEL site under FAQ, last question it explains it common to see these distortions/blemishes with polarized sunglasses. For me, this was something that bothered me, did not want to see it and was the beginning of the end for my XPEL install.
On my 3rd return visit to installer for dirt/grime finding its



way under the seams, peeling under a headlight and need to rent a car again, I decided to have him remove it all. I never filed a case with XPEL and the installer removed it at no cost.
The installer was always willling to make corrections but my mind was made up.
Almost 1 year later been lucky no chips. I'm glad I had it removed.
So if you wear polarized sunglasses these distortions/blemishes as noted by XPEL may be something to consider.
On the other hand having a black car I would really consider having it done and only by a very qualified XPEL installer.

 

I got the whole car done with XPEL, right away after it was brand new. Literally drove 40mph with lots of room for any cars in front of me from the dealer to the install to avoid any chance of chips. The paint correction is key - the car will basically have perma-gloss after the job. Also key is finding the right installer. I went full, so the entire car except for anything glass and the rear diffuser (the shape is too complex). Everything else was covered. For any car I will own this will now be standard procedure. I had the front clip of my Porsche Boxster Spyder done and it saved huge damage when someone rubbed the front corner pulling out of a parallel parking spot, and has saved many scratches on my wife's car as well. So you can see the impact of paint correction, have a look at the two attached pics, which were taken by my installer for me so I could see the before/after. The car is a 2019 C63s Coupe in Brilliant Blue.

 

Wanted to add one thing I forgot to mention. The pics two posts above shows an example of a poor install, IMO. Most XPEL installers just use the templates from XPEL. The problem with those is they don't wrap the panel edges, so the film stops short of the edges and dirt etc. can get under it. You can ask them to customize the templates for a proper fit and wrapped edges. This is what I did. It makes it more expensive of course, but you are unlikely to have issues with the film in the future. This is why I paid $4000 for the job and it took them 3 days to properly do it. You do get what you pay for in this business. BTW, my install also wrapped the rear diffuser and all the carbon fiber and glossy parts around the car. I have the Aero package, which adds some complicated shapes to the front and rear lower parts of the car. As for the artifacts with polarized sunglasses, I realize that XPEL mentions it as normal on their website, but I don't have any. Maybe it's an issue on lighter color cars, but you can't tell that there is film on any of my panels of my Obsidian black coupe with or without polarized sunglasses. I'm a big fan of polarized sunglasses and wear them all the time. It's the reason I didn't opt for the HUD for example. I know these artifacts are an issue on matte paints, but I've honestly never seen this on glossy paint.

 

I have 20k on my black car now - the front end is destroyed. It looks like it was sand blasted. This picture is up on the hood - look near the light source reflection (the entire hood looks like this but hides itself). My car is non metallic and this is after a full correction.

Now, it's even worse on the front bumper that has a horizontal plane to the incoming damage.