You’re probably excited about what your car will look like when it rolls off the dealer’s lot. If you’ve just got yourself a brand new car from somewhere like Intelligent Car Leasing, you should be expecting big things from it. It should be clear, glossy, flawless. In reality, that is unlikely; at least the flawless part. While your brand new car may be clean and free from dirt or grime, the paint has likely already taken a beating during its time at the dealership. A dealer’s lot is not a happy place for a car’s paint. Your dealership has dozens of cars in their possession. They are often being stored outside and exposed to the elements. They are there to be sold, not maintained. So the main objective when they are cleaned is speed, not care. If a dealership spent the appropriate amount of time caring for the paint on each car in their lot, they wouldn’t have any time left to sell. That means that just because a car is new, doesn’t mean it will look new. This may disappoint you, especially if you spent a large sum of money on the vehicle. However, if you were to find a deal on low price car insurance, you could probably turn some of that disappointment into happiness.
Case In Point: Paint Defects in a Brand New Jaguar F-Type
We recently served the owner of a brand new 2017 Jaguar F-Type. This particular car was purchased from a dealership in California and delivered on a flatbed straight to our shop. Though the car was brand new, the paint was not in good condition.
Scratches
A number of small scratches created significant eye-sores in the paint. The side of the front right rear well looked was scuffed. We also found scratches on the hood, the trunk lid, and side panels. They could have been caused by debris in the lot, improper washing, or careless driving through the dealership.
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Swirl Marks
Swirl marks are a large collection of hairline scratches in a car’s clear coat. They are particularly visible when light reflects on the paint from certain angles. Swirl marks are caused by improper washing technique. When a rag or wash-mitt is improperly cleaned and then dragged along the surface of a vehicle, dozens upon dozens of tiny scratches occur. This Jaguar F-Type had its fair share of dealership swirl marks.
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Hard Water Spots
Hard water spots were also prevalent in the paint. They occur when a car is not properly dried. A water droplet typically contains a certain amount of minerals. When a droplet is allowed to dry on a vehicle, the water evaporates, but mineral deposits remain. If not treated, hard water spots can create permanent damage to a car’s factory paint.
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Making a New Vehicle Look New
After this vehicle was delivered to our shop, we did an extensive amount of work to restore the paint. The first step was to give the vehicle a thorough wash to remove all contaminants from the surface. We then did a multi-stage machine polish to all painted surfaces and applied touch up paint where necessary. With careful attention to every inch of the vehicle, we were able to restore the paint to the showroom shine it ought to have.
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Adding Protection to Keep a New Vehicle Looking New
Once we were sure the paint was in pristine condition, we started adding layers of protection to the vehicle so that it would not only look new when delivered to the customer, but for many years down the road. We first tinted the windows with LLumar CTX Nano-Ceramic window film. After that we wrapped the whole vehicle in LLumar Platinum Paint Protection Film. Finally, we covered all painted and wrapped surfaces with Opti-Coat Pro Ceramic Coating.
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The Final Product
We took some images of the final product so that you can judge the results for yourself.
The best part about this project is not only that a brand new Jaguar F-Type now looks like it should look when it’s brand new, but that the protection this car owner chose for his vehicle will help to keep it looking like-new thousands of miles later.
If you’d like to learn more about protecting your vehicle, read our formal introduction to Paint Protection Film, where we outline the benefits, history, and technology of premium automotive protective films.
