Since I have been driving my car I have noticed there has been a decent amount of paint chips on the hood. Before I bought it was kept in the garage all its life and I understand the more I drive it this will continue to occur, however after a 300 mile trip last weekend it seems a bit excessive amount of chips on the hood. A friend recommended protective paint film to be applied to the hood, bumper, fenders, however price range is about $1,200 to $1,500 to do it. Have as anyone had this done to any of their vehicles and was it worth it? My other thoughts are to leave it happen and when it gets so bad then have the hood repainted? If the car wasn't in such great shape I wouldn't be so concerned, but the paint is in excellent looking condition.

 

I've had it on a couple cars now (DIY installed though), and it does an excellent job. If installed correctly, it'll be practically 100% invisible too.

There are a few things to be aware of:

​​​​​-it's not a one and done thing for life, itll eventually need to be stripped. The life span of it depends on material used and how much sun the car sees (and where on the planet you are: a car parked outside 24/7 in Anchorage is differnet from the same car parked in Phoenix). Over time itll become lightly yellowed, dulled and more brittle and can eventually turn cloudy if left way too long. Once it gets brittle, the removal process is 100x harder as it just shreds. I removed ours at about 5 years on daily drivers and IMO it was pretty much done at that point - but fortunately still came off in larger chunks with heat applied.

-it does block some UV, so paint fade covered vs not is different (which is why a lot of the folks with exotics do 100% wrap of it). I made the mistake of doing a 1/3 hood on our Edge and after 5 years / removal, there was a noticeable fade line in the hood. At a minimum, Id never do a partial panel again - it would be less obvious if the transition was at a panel gap.

-there really isnt a way to repair it. If it gets swirls/scratches, a deep rock hit, or starts going matte from sun fade, you generally either live with it or replace it (the good thing is it did its job protecting the paint). Not an issue for most people, but I know some folks are fanatical about paint correction and mirror perfect paint finish which you'll never really be able to achieve with worn ppf.

-Confirm what material theyll use. Any reputable shop will use the good stuff, but there are a ton of knockoffs out there for places trying make a quick buck lowballing the other guys.



IMO its a better route than just letting it happen and repainting later. Good prep and paint work is substantially more expensive and notoriously hard to perfectly color match on a used car. Certainly not impossible / better if it's blended into adjacent panels - but Im sure you've seen plenty of cars driving down the road with one panel that's not quite right.

 

Thank you bumpin96 for your thoughts, this is great information and helpful to me, much appreciated.

 

Youre welcome!

One other thing I thought of - you may want to consider adding the mirrors (or maybe even subbing fenders for mirrors to keep price down). Rock / debris damage tends to mostly focus on anything it can see from the front view of the car. Certainly there's a bit of fender exposed there, but practically the entire painted part of the mirrors are.