I've wrap my roof rack and it's actually easier than other parts. I removed it and started on the underside, it's flat. I did have vinyl long enough so I section it off. It looks way better as on strip, still looks good with two strips but up close you can see it. I'm a novice doing it, but with a lot of practice and a heat gun, you will get better with time.

If you have someone to help, you can apply one strip all the way across without any crease, one person hold the vinyl straight the other scrap the air bubble out. If you don't have another person to help, just do half way at a time. Good luck, it does make the car look better in my opinion.

 

Thanks MrT.

I ordered a sample from 3M and spent some time on their youtube page watching videos last night... I think I'm going to give it a shot once I practice a bit with the samples.

Hey not to side track, but does your MINI have bike attachments (or some kind of attachments) on the rack and a side mount front license plate?

I think I may have been behind you yesterday, turning left on to Michigan in Santa Monica. If it was, your MINI looks awesome and is what inspired me to start looking into how to do this stuff myself.

 

dez,

Thank you for the compliments. That was me. I thought that might have been you, your car is one of the best looking blacked out MINI around town. I have a surf board attachment on top of the rack. I wrap some of the chrome/silver parts on it too. Looks better with no silver showing

 

cool

thx to your as well... hopefully it will look a little better with some vinyl

 

I'm late to my own party!

MrT offered some good suggestions. In the picture you can see that I removed the cross bars and wrapped them each in a single piece. Before I peeled the backing I folded the vinyl in half to create a center line. I also drew a pencil line down the center of the bottom of the cross bars. When I peeled the backing off I was still able to see the crease, then I carefully laid the cross bars on the vinyl, making sure that both pencil lines were lined up with the crease. From there I flipped the cross bar over and began smoothing everything toward the top channel. I had excess on the sides and in the channel that I trimmed at the end. To wrap the vinyl into the channel I used a "L" shaped feeler guage to get a tight fit.

Good luck. Vinyl is all about practice and patience.

 

Thanks for the additional tips!

I got my samples from 3M and plan on practicing a bit this weekend.

I'll report back once I get my rack done.

 

Did my own wrapping today, gave the 1080 a shot on the gas cap

 

Mindspin, nicely done! Did you have any trouble wrapping the lift "handle"?

 

The only trouble I had was figuring out a way to cleanly finish it off. Obviously, the vinyl wouldnt cleanly stretch over it, so I just kinda winged it and made a cut and sorta overlapped two pieces.

Its not perfect, but you will only really notice with when you have your finger back there.


I have a sheet of the Di-noc vinyl as well, wondering if I should use that on my mirror caps, or order more 1080 and keep it consistent.

 

I've tried the DiNoc film on my 04 S4 interior pieces before and it worked nicely. But is it any different from the 1080?

 

1080 is thinner than di-noc, so I presume its easier to form around curves and things

 

Hmmm that sounds better. How is everyones exterior pieces holding up to the heat/ sun and weathering?

 

No problems here, but my MINI is garaged from late afternoon to morning and I coat all of my vinyl in Sonus Total Eclipse every other wash. The stuff is very similar to Aerospace 303 spray - "SPF 40 for your stuff!"

 

Well I ordered a sample of the carbon fiber black, light tint for my side markers and then some yellow tint to see how that looks on the fogs, but I might go the nokya route eventually. Did you prime lots of areas before applying or simply alcohol cleaned?

 

Tried to do the chrome portion of the scuttle, was going great until I got to the S. Vinyl started tearing, wasnt fun. Maybe Ill just have to pay Lyle to do those.

 

Definitely cleaned everything with alcohol, but only primed areas that had tight bends or creases.

S scuttles are SO hard! I was pretty surprised by how well my first set turned out (only a few creases next to the S), but within a few days the vinyl began pulling away exposing the chrome below. This was because I had to stretch it so hard in some areas. This is why I plasti'd the insert and wrapped the housing.

IMG_2976-1.jpg?t=1325093886

I later noticed the Lyle does his scuttles in two pieces (or at least with a slit/fold near the front edge). They're hard to see but look at the top and bottom near the front vent.

 

Yea, I tried to do the mirror covers as well, another tough one.

Might just have to sack up and pay Lyle for the scuttles and mirror covers

 

I remember seeing a video a while back of three people vinyl wrapping a MINI mirror cover. One dude had his hand inside the cover while the two others held the 4 edges of the vinyl. On the count of 3 they pulled it down over the covers as hard as they could.
I can't seem to find the video but I'll post it if I do.

 

Yea, I tried laying a piece on top and just working my way down. I almost had it but then I stretched it too far and distorted the weave big time.

Gonna order some more 1080 and try again.

 

Hey nate, how did you apply the tint to your side markers? did you use water and squeegee it? or hairdryer?

 

Funny you ask since after years of applying vinyl windows decals using the wet method, I tried that with the side marker tint...but it's a no-go. The wet method doesn't work for vinyl wrapping.

I may have used a little blow drying near the end to tuck the edges, but I did most of it at room temp. I cut a piece of tinted vinyl nearly twice the size of the marker and stretched it pretty good to begin with. I used a combination of my metal feeler gauges (pictured on page 1) and my finger nails to tuck the edges to the back side.


Speaking of technique...I stripped the plastidip off my headlight rings recently and attempted to wrap them in 3M glossy black Scotchprint. Epic fail...twice! I feel like a have a good grasp of vinyl wrapping by now but I stuffed this one. I only have enough vinyl for one ring now.
I know I can do it by leaving a small overlap seam near the bottom of the ring, but I want a single piece of perfection and I'm struggling.
One attempt was with the ring removed and placed on my workbench, the other was still mounted to the car, but with the hood propped up and away from the headlight.

If anyone has any tips for the headlight rings, please chime in!

 

Well it looks like ill be trying out the scuttles and a few other things this saturday! Il post up the results

 

Latest tool added to my vinyl wrapping arsenal: standard vinyl wrapping card wrapped in "cham-wow" material.

Used 3M 90 spray adhesive to attach the fabric to the card - now I have an anti-scratch tool for those glossy vinyls.

 

man...i love love love the wrapped CF look. very well done!

 

Thanks a lot! I'm still really happy with the CF, but I've been having a good time playing with 3M's glossy black Scotchprint lately.

Two days ago I stripped the plastidip from headlight rings and washer covers and wrapped them all in glossy black. I botched my first two attempts, but nailed it by the third. I have to say they turned out flawless and match my MB paint perfectly. Also, I'm just about done wrapping my door sill plates in glossy black too. I recently dropped a wrench on my driver's side sill plate and it dented it pretty badly, so I puttied, sanded, and wrapped it. I would love to find a John Cooper signature decal small enough to put over the black sill plate.

Thanks again for the compliments!

And the fun never ends...