Don Nguyen

Sorry if I have not responded to PMs or e-mails as fast/quickly over the last week or so. I had a friend pass away. His name was Jonathan Pham. He was the person who got me into doing vinyl and the reason why I do vinyl wrapping today, so I had been busy attending to his passing.

I had this white Mercedes Benz C63 AMG sedan come by to have me vinyl wrap the roof of their car in my gloss black material to give it the panoramic roof look. I believe the owner of this car was from Los Angeles and drove out to me in Orange County / Anaheim Hills to have the work done. I also did the side front bumper slats in the matte 3M carbon fiber di-noc material, which was a bit tricky to cut, since it had to be done freehand and there were no real lines/curves to follow. I forgot to take the before pictures, but I am sure you can imagine what a white roof would have looked like on this car before I vinyl wrapped the roof black.

Blacking out the chrome in either gloss or matte black vinyl to give it the shadowline look would really complete the look of this car imo and give it an aggressive look/stance.













-Don Nguyen

donathon@gmail.com

Don Nguyen

The owner of this car came out to me in Orange County from the Los Angeles area to have me lightly smoke / tint the tail lights on his black Mercedes Benz CLK55. In addition to the tail lights I also smoked / tinted the headlights and the side blinkers on the mirrors of his car. This light smoke / tint shade is nice, because it is not too dark and won't block out too much of the light output from the head/tail lights. Also, since this film material has a gloss finish to it, it'll give a shine to your headlights or tail lights again if they are a bit dull from age/wear.

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Tinted / smoked inner smaller passenger side headlight:


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-Don Nguyen

donathon@gmail.com

Don Nguyen

Had this new body black Mercedes Benz CLS63 come by to have me black out the chrome / aluminum trim around the windows and back rear trunk handle chrome piece. We went with matte black finish material so that the trim pieces still accented the car and did not disappear completely into the body of the car. You can notice it when I take the pictures, the trim pieces still pop out a little bit in the pictures. It gives it a nice contrast if that's what you are trying to go for. The owner of this car was also from Orange County.

By blacking out the chrome it really makes the red calipers and other parts of the car pop more.

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-Don Nguyen

donathon@gmail.com

Don Nguyen

The owner of this blue F10 BMW 550i contacted me to see if I could vinyl wrap the diffuser on his car with the 3M 1080 gloss carbon fiber material. He brought his car out to me in Orange County from around Riverside, for me do to the work on his car. Usually a lot of diffusers are not very practical to wrap due to their shapes/curves, which makes it hard for the vinyl to stick and stay conformed to over time. However, this one was fairly flat and there wasn't too much heat from around the exhaust areas on this car so that was a good thing as well.

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-Don Nguyen

donathon@gmail.com

Don Nguyen

The owner of this car wanted to have me wrap both the roof and the two side pillar pieces that run front the bottom of the front windshield to the back of the roof with my gloss black vinyl wrap material to give it the panoramic look. The gloss black vinyl wrap makes the roof continue and flow with the front/rear windshields pretty well. The owner of this car was from Irvine / Orange County also and brought his car over to me in Anaheim Hills to have the roof done. The tail lights were previously tinted / smoked by him beforehand, so that's not something I did.

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-Don Nguyen

donathon@gmail.com

Don Nguyen

I know I don't post this often, but I also do clear headlight film protection as well. I just never really take pictures of it, since you can never really see or tell the difference of a before and after

In this picture the driver side has already been done and the passenger side has been applied, just waiting to be trimmed. You can see everything is custom fitted, since I do not use pre cut materials. This allows me to cover more of the headlights than pre cut pieces do and also get a closer/better fit to the pieces that I am covering/applying the material to.

Clear headlight protective film is good if you have glass headlights, so it'll prevent rocks from cracking it or chipping it. This can also be applied to fog lights, which are more prone to cracking, since they're lower/closer to the ground. Even if your headlights are plastic, the film will help prevent nicks and chips in the plastic lenses. It'll also help protect/prevent against oxidation better. If your headlights are already oxidized/faded, I can clear/clean those up for you before putting on the clear film.





I know clear bras / clear headlight protection films aren't very exciting, so I figured I'd post pictures of this gray / silver Mercedes Benz E55 AMG's tail lights that I tinted as well. This is my lighter shade that I used for this cars tail lights. Unlike a lot of the other tail lights that I have posted recently, I only tinted the clear portions on this car's tail lights versus tinting the whole thing. So these pictures will be good to help show those who were interested in something similar for their cars and were wondering how just the clear portion would look like tinted / smoked, only slightly darkening the clear parts of the tail light.

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-Don Nguyen

donathon@gmail.com

Don Nguyen

I think I work on more AMG cars than non AMG cars when it comes to Mercedes, haha. I blacked out the chrome / aluminum window trim on this black Mercedes Benz C63 AMG with my matte black vinyl material to give it the shadowline look. Owner came out to me in Orange County / Anaheim Hills to have the work done. I took some more detailed pictures of the corners and edges for those who were interested and asking me for them.

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-Don Nguyen

donathon@gmail.com

Don Nguyen

This gray / silver Mazda RX-8 came by to have me vinyl wrap the hood of his car with the 3M Di-Noc matte carbon fiber vinyl material to cover over his factory black hood that he had on there. The owner of this car drove up to me in Anaheim Hills / Orange County from San Diego county to have me do the vinyl work on his car. The weather was a bit over cast that day, so the carbon fiber weave in the vinyl did not stand out that much when photographed. From further away, the vinyl appears more of a solid flat/matte-ish and then when you get closer you start seeing the carbon fiber weaves in the vinyl.

As comparison, the eyelids on the headlights are real carbon fiber pieces.

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-Don Nguyen

donathon@gmail.com

Don Nguyen

These aren't the greatest pictures in the world, since I was in a bit of a rush when taking them. I wasn't going to use them, but it's not often that I get a domestic car, so I decided to just post them anyways. The owner of this red / orange Chevy Camaro came from Huntington Beach area out to me in Anaheim Hills to get the vinyl work done. He originally had a matte black vinyl roof installed on his car but he wanted to change the look up and get a gloss black roof put on there this time around.

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After (gloss roof):










-Don Nguyen

donathon@gmail.com

Don Nguyen

I had this newer 2012 or 2011 alpine white BMW E93 335i convertible come by for me to tint / smoke their tail lights and black out the chrome window trim (I'll post pictures of that process later). The owner of this car was from Irvine / Orange County and drove out to me in Anaheim Hills to get the vinyl work done. The tint / smoke film is very light and just slightly darkens the tail lights enough to give it a very factory look. It's light enough where you most likely won't get any hassle from cops about them. It's also light enough where if you put it on the headlights, fog lights, etc, it won't reduce the light output by that much compared to darker films.

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Only driver side trunk tail light is tinted in this picture:


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-Don Nguyen

donathon@gmail.com

Don Nguyen

Took a while for the owner of this car and for me to figure/find out a time for him to be able to bring his car by to get the chrome / aluminum window trim wrapped in my gloss black vinyl material to give it that shadowline look. The owner of this car was from Los Angeles and brought his car out to me in Anaheim Hills / Orange County. He went with the gloss black over the matte black finish to get more of that factory BMW sport package look. I have seen cars come with the window trim in matte black as well, but I don't know what package those come with or are offered with.

Everything is wrapped seamlessly and tucked in where ever possible, to provide the longest lasting results.

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-Don Nguyen

donathon@gmail.com

Don Nguyen

I forgot to take the before pictures of this car before wrapping the roof, but you guys can probably imagine what it looked like before/stock with the white roof. The owner of this alpine white BMW E60 5 series came by to my shop in Anaheim Hills / Orange County from around Los Angeles to have the roof wrapped in my gloss black vinyl material. Went with the gloss black to give it a clean factory look, similar to what the car would have looked like if it came with a panoramic roof. Also took some close up pictures around the sunroof, edges, rails, etc for you guys to see the details that goes into my installs.

















-Don Nguyen

donathon@gmail.com

Don Nguyen

This Alpine White BMW E90 4-door 335i came by to have me vinyl wrap his chrome / brushed aluminum window trim with my matte black vinyl material. The owner of this car was also from Irvine / Orange County. In addition to doing his window trim, I also wrapped his roof with the 3M di-noc matte carbon fiber finish to really set off the car. We had the antenna fin cover painted matte black, which went fairly well with the matte finish of the roof. The matte black window trim and matte roof also ties in together nicely. Also as a reference point, the trunk spoiler is real carbon fiber. From further away the carbon fiber finish looks more of a solid matte / flat black finish, but as you get closer to the car/roof, the carbon fiber weaves/design becomes more visible, which is also another nice subtle touch/look.















-Don Nguyen

donathon@gmail.com

Don Nguyen

Even on a more stock-ish car, blacking out the chrome / aluminum window trim can change the dynamics of the car's looks greatly. It won't necessarily give it a modified/aftermarket look, but it definitely adds to the car's look, while still looking factory. The owner of this car drove out to me in Orange County / Anaheim Hills to get the wrap done. Everything is done seamlessly and in one piece to retain that factory look and without making it seem like a wrap job. We went with the matte black on this car to still give it some contrast and accent the trim pieces, instead of going with gloss black which would have made it kind of disappear into the car's black paint.

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-Don Nguyen

donathon@gmail.com

Don Nguyen

Seems like there are a lot of fans of wagons, so here are pictures of a blue E46 325i wagon / touring that I worked on recently. The owner of this car actually lived down the street from me in Irvine / Orange County, so I dropped by their house to do the vinyl wrap. The owner wanted me to black out his chrome / aluminum window trim. I went with the matte black to give it more of an aggressive look and it went well with all of the other matte black weather rubber pieces that lined the window trim and the overall look of the car.

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-Don Nguyen

donathon@gmail.com

Don Nguyen

Thanks for everyone who was able to make it out to me while I was up in norcal / Bay Area doing vinyl wraps. I only had one car that cancelled on me without any notice (which is a first out of all of my trips that I have been/gone up there), but other than that everything went good as usual.

This was one of the last cars that I did while up there, and I was a bit excited, so I forgot to take some before pictures of it. The owner of this white Subaru STI wagon / hatch brought his car to me to have me vinyl wrap the roof of his car with my gloss black vinyl material. Subarus are one of those cars that can pull off the matte or gloss black look. Since there is no sunroof on this car, it gives it a very smooth and continuous result / look.















-Don Nguyen

donathon@gmail.com

Don Nguyen

These aren't the best pictures in the world, since the owner of this car came later in the day and there was a lot of work that he wanted done on his car, so by the time I finished, it was already fairly late in the day. The owner of this car drove from San Diego up to me in Anaheim Hills / Orange County to get the vinyl work done. He wanted me to vinyl wrap his roof, roof spoiler, front splitters, side B pillars, and rear lower bumper diffuser all in the 3M di noc matte carbon fiber vinyl material finish. Personally, I do not like wrapping rear diffusers, but since the owner of this car was getting a lot of other work done, I decided to do it for him/his car.

Front splitters:


Roof spoiler:




Rear diffuser:




Roof:














Side pillars:


-Don Nguyen

donathon@gmail.com

Don Nguyen

Another car I did on my most recent trip up to norcal / Bay Area to do vinyl wrapping. I liked this car, because it was a unique color and different from the black or white cars that I am usually working on, so it's a nice change of pace. I believe it was a BMW E90 330i or 328i sedan, and I don't know the exact name of the color of this car, but it was almost greenish/silverish/blueish in different lightings. For this car, we went with the matte black vinyl for his window trim over the gloss black to match the rubber around the window trim and his B pillars, which were also matte black already. I think the final results turned out great. Everything is done seamlessly without any awkward seam lines in random places and everything gets tucked in underneath the weather stripping.

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-Don Nguyen

donathon@gmail.com

Don Nguyen

Went over to my friend's shop (Serge @ BenzWorks in Huntington Beach / Orange County) to tint / smoke the tail lights on this white CLS63 AMG. I only tinted / smoked the clear portion of the tail lights and I left the red alone. This gives the car slightly more character with just the subtle change in shade of the clear portion of the tail lights. It's a fairly light shade, so it almost feels factory looking, so it goes well even on cars that are more lightly modified or more on the stock-ish side.

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-Don Nguyen

donathon@gmail.com

Don Nguyen

Here's one of the 350z's that I did some vinyl work on while up in the bay area / norcal. The owner of this silver 350z wanted me to vinyl wrap his roof in my gloss black material. His windshield, side windows, and rear windshield were also tinted. He wanted to give it a continuous flow / look from the roof to the front/rear windshield, which is what we got with the final results once everything was done. It looked good. The gloss black matched nicely with the glass.

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-Don Nguyen

donathon@gmail.com

Don Nguyen

I thought I had posted pictures of this car already, but I guess I haven't yet. This was from my earlier/prior trip to norcal / Bay Area to do vinyl wrapping. The owner of this car originally was only going to have me vinyl wrap his roof in the 3M di-noc carbon fiber material, but he also ended up having me do the top of his trunk with the 3M di noc matte carbon fiber material as well. The hood and rear trunk lip spoiler are real carbon fiber pieces, so that'll give you an idea of how the two compare/matches up. In addition to his roof and trunk, I also wrapped his chrome / brushed aluminum window trim with my matte black vinyl material. I forgot to take more detailed pictures of that, but you can kind of see it in the roof pictures. There were still a couple of bubbles that were working themselves out when I took these pictures, so you may notice it in some of the pictures.

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-Don Nguyen

donathon@gmail.com

Don Nguyen

Although white cars may look the best with the gloss black roofs, black cars definitely benefit one of the most when it comes to getting their chrome / brushed aluminum window trims blacked out. I believe the owner of this car is also on this forum. The owner of this car brought their jet black E46 325i (or it was a 330i) coupe to have me wrap his window trim in my matte black vinyl material to give it that shadowline look. We went with the matte black to get that slight contrast. Overall, I think it turned out great and changed the look of the car dramatically. Even on a more stock-ish car, doing this still benefits and changes the overall look of the car quite a bit.

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-Don Nguyen

donathon@gmail.com

Don Nguyen

I don't think a lot of people know, but I also have/use a clear yellow transparent film as well. Normally I use this film for fog lights, etc, but the owner of this white 350z wanted to have me wrap the headlights of his car with my transparent yellow vinyl film material. I know this is definitely not for everybody, but this will at least show you what my transparent yellow film looks like. The owner of this car was from around Long Beach I believe and drove out to me in Anaheim Hills / Orange County to get the vinyl work done.

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-Don Nguyen

donathon@gmail.com

Don Nguyen

Another car I did in one of my previous trips to norcal / Bay area. The owner of this silver Mercedes Benz CLS65 AMG had me vinyl wrap the roof of his car with the 3M 1080 gloss carbon fiber vinyl material. In addition to the roof, I also vinyl wrapped his chrome window trim with my matte black vinyl. Blacking out the window trim really complimented the roof and also dark colored wheels that the car already had. As comparison, the side B pillars have real carbon fiber overlays on them.



















-Don Nguyen

donathon@gmail.com

Don Nguyen

The chrome / brushed aluminum on the window trims of this silver BMW E46 325i sedan was starting to fade/oxidize. So instead of buying replacement trim pieces or trying to paint them, the owner of this car had me vinyl wrap them with my matte black vinyl instead. This was a quicker, simpler, and overall better solution. We went with the matte black to match the matte finish on the wheels. I did this car while I was out over at my friend's shop in Huntington Beach / Orange County.

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-Don Nguyen

donathon@gmail.com