I like having a sleeper, but I wouldn't mind doing a couple small things to make the car look slightly more aggressive to the informed bystander. The car is black to start with.

Have others blacked out the window surround, and how did you do it/have it done?

How about the grill and the piece of chrome above the rear plate?

I use the roof rails, so I'd rather not mess with them.

Lastly, I see a lot of clear side-marker lights on Ebay, but has anyone bought some that they were very pleased with?

Thanks for the help,
Chris

Chris, check the link out in my sig. I did gloss black 3M vinyl for the front grill and the window trim and then plastidip for emblems and chrome piece above rear plate. Worked great.

X

Thanks. That does look good. Did you do that yourself or have someone do it?

BTW, I didnt see a link in your sig, but I looked at older pics of your car form previous threads.

Had my tint shop do the vinyl.

Did all the plastidipping my self.

Search for my thread "E63 Estate".
Pics of blacked out trim and emblems on my wagon.
Jim

IMHO blacking out the window trim is an absolute necessity on a wagon. Really cleans up the lines of the car, so the wagon area doesn't look so bulbous. I did mine with Plasti-dip, but I wouldn't recommend it due to the time required.

The badges and the rear chrome strip were ridiculously easy with plastidip. Like an hour or two, start to finish.

or did you remove and or use new ones?

That is a sexy wagon! I was thinking of plasti dipping the badges and trims. What did you find difficult with the window trims compared to other trims? Any tips on what not to do?

I Plasti-dipped the badges without removing them. No reason to remove anything. This was my first experience with Plasti-dip and it was simple.

With the badges, you simply spray everything, then when you pull it off the paint, it doesn't pull the stuff off the badge if there's a nice sharp lip. With window trip, you simply can't do this; it will rip the material right off the trim piece. So there's a few ways to modify the process for the trim, but I won't bother suggesting one since I never found a great way to do it.

Also, the masking is much more time consuming since the window trim spans so far.

On a sedan, the MB emblem on the trunk is very difficult to plastidip. I tried 3 times and it peeled off the center spokes each time. I ended up buying a new emblem, sticking it to a piece of cardboard, plastidipping it and then installing it. It was a relative pain to remove and it did ruin the emblem that was installed on the car.

Good luck

X

Hot!! I plan on painting mine that looks great

For my trim and rear chrome piece on the hatch I used tape from these guys: http://shadowlinetrim.com/

I purchased a new set of badges and had those, along with my sidemarkers, painted by the local body shop. My sidemarkers were paint matched to that of the car. If you go that route, just make sure you tuck the bulbs back behind the bumper nicely so no light shines through. Personally I thought the clear side markers looked a bit funny...

I ordered some of the Shadowline trim tape in matte black (2 rolls)

Any hints on application?

Anyone try covering the roof rails in vinyl (and then using them???)

Is your car the Designo Matte Grey color? If so, did you have any issues with the tape leaving marks on the paint when applying to the chrome window trim? I am waiting for delivery of my matte grey wagon and have concerns the tape may cause issues of some sort.

For all you guys talking about painting and removing badges I would suggest trying plastidip first. Readily available at Home Depot or Loews. Watch a video on YouTube and try it. The masking for emblems is easy and applying and removing the plastidip is ridiculously easy. No brainier and ou can remove any time. It's like a 1 on a scale of 1-10 DIY.