I drive highway - and a lot of it. my current car is chipped to hell all around the nose. I think I recall reading that due to the Mini's shape they are stone collectors on the highways. The 3M clear bra is $1,000 dealer installed, is this worth it in your opinion?

 

We have the 3M film on both of our cabrios, and it's definitely worth it, but not for the $1000 your dealer wants. Odds are, your dealer just sends the cars to a local shop - see if you can find out who that shop is and deal with them directly.

That's what we did, and for each car, it was $450 to do the front bumper, headlights, foglights, first 18" of the bonnet, grille slats, hood scoop, and mirror backs.

 

Short answer: The search engine is your friend.

Long answer: Seriously. The search engine really is your friend.

You'll find about 20 threads on this board discussing the pros and cons of the clearbra. Without trying to ignite yet another debate, let me just say that I love my clearbra but $1000 is at the top end of the price range. If your installer is an expert and he/she is covering the bumper, at least 18 inches of the bonnet, parking lights, headlights, mirror caps, and door edges, I'd say it's a fair price.

 

+3

We have clear bras on 3 cars (2 MINIs - 1 MCS & 1 MC) and will never go without it on a new car. All installs were DIY, though...

 

Yep - the clear bra will definitely be the first thing we do to any new car from here on out. My wife's MINI was five months old before we had the bra installed, so I had to fix seven rock chips first (not wanting to immortalize the chips forever under the film). When my MINI arrived, the clear bra was installed within two days.

 

I spoke to an installer yesterday who said he would not do the bumper, because he said he had problems in the past with acceptable quality. Needless to say I'm going to use an installer who will do the bumper, but has anyone heard of problems covering the bumper before?

 

I have it on my '07 MCSa. I wasn't sure I wanted to spend the $400 it cost me to have it installed prior to picking up the car, but now that it's on there, I won't have any more new cars without it.

My dealer did not do the install - they have a local shop who does it, and they did a fantastic job. The entire front facing surfaces are covered, including the bumper, headlights, fog lights, mirrors, leading edge of the rear wheel wells, and even the door edges.

IMHO, money well spent (but I wouldn't have taken the plunge if they'd asked a thousand bucks).

 

Well, it's definitely the most-involved part of the install, because of the compound curves, cutouts for the fog lamps, etcetera etcetera, but I've never heard of an installer having trouble with it. The installer that did our cars just used the computer-cut patten provided by 3M, and they went on with no problems.

 

Do you know the name of the shop that installed your clear bra? I'd really like to get the 3M but there aren't any installers in my area.

 

A guy named Bruce Horton at X-pel of the Triad ([SIZE=-1]336-414-3390?) [/SIZE]does the Flow installs and did mine - does good work and is WAY less than $1000... or was a year ago... he's a mature (read: older) gent who is a car nut and is VERY meticulous - he does Ferraris and the like...

 

Just noticed this thread. I have the clear bra on my 2005 with 48,000 miles. It has numerous tears and nicks. They look better than paint chips, in my opinion, but they are still blemishes. I suspect that replacing the clear bra (and detailing) will probably cost about as much as repainting the front of a car with chips. Which is best? I don't know.

 

How many months/miles on the bra, and what brand is it?

I've taken some hard rock hits on the protected surfaces of my car with no signs of damage to the paint or the film, and I shudder to think of what it would take to actually *tear* the material, or even to nick it.

As for replacing the bra or repainting, a friend just had her bonnet and front bumper repainted by a quality body shop for $1350, including replacing the bonnet stripes. I'm pretty sure you could have the clear bra removed/replaced, along with a good polishing before the new bra is applied, for a little over half that amount.

 

Two years and almost 50,000 miles. One impact actually has left a small dent. the tears are just large nicks. I would equate it to the windshield, the nicks would be cracks in the windshield, of which I have just one. But of course, the front of the hood is much lower than the windshield.

I've driven a long ways fast. New Mexico can be a stony state . . .the wind blows gravel onto the shoulder of the highway, big rigs draw it up onto the road.

Your figures sound right. I'm thinking painting to cost $500-$700.

 

Yeah - I have a couple of "divots" as I call them - maybe 2-3mm nicks - that I've picked up over the past 22,000 miles. But I'm confident those would have been MONSTER chips (or worse) had whatever chunks of gravel made them actually contacted my paint... even with those blemishes, from 6 feet away the car looks GREAT... and much less work to maintain that look than if I had no clearbra (because I'd be touching up little chips constantly)....

 

Anybody buy the bra and install it themselves?

MUST we pay installers ...or is this the kind of thing one can do for ones self?

-BH

.

 

I have done it myself. I will tell you this that it take about 4 hours to do both the bumper and the hood. It will depend on much your time is worth . It is not a hard task at all.

 

Hey thanks. That is encouraging. I mean, I have time ...sometimes ...okay, actually I NEVER have any time, but I WISH I did.

How much did you pay for the parts?

-B

.

 

Bought the precut bumper and all front light coverings and DIY'd the install- very easy ,but require some time and a little patience. Then I purchased the uncut material on ebay motors and designed patterns to cover the the front of the hood, headlight bezels, behind the front wheels, in front of the rear wheels and rear bumper guards. Total cost was less than $100 for all materials-precut and uncut. Designing the patterns took some time. But the installation went very quickly after having a little more experience. A quote locally for all of this was around $1000.00.

 

I still want to get one for my wife. . . although . . . we might want to do a group buy for the Hotties of NAM!

 

As others have said, it's not hard, as long as you allot yourself enough time, go slowly, and are patient.

One thing I would point out is that not all of the protective films are created equal. Some of the inexpensive film you get on eBay, for example, is significantly thicker than the stuff you get from Xpel or 3M. This might make it a little harder to work with, and the edges of the film are likely going to be more visible once it's on your car.

 

We decided to purchase the thicker, less expensive ,similar quality and guaranteed film since it was a DIY. We figured if we messed up the install, our investment was far less than had we used the far more expensive name brand. As it turned out the installation was a success, but not without a bit of patience. You can barely see the edges as you appoach the car but that only makes sense because it's thicker, hence providing additional protection at a fraction of the cost. Have yet to receive any comments pro or con since it is not noticeable. Everyone involved was pleased with the results of the installation.

 

To those about to get the clear bra installed, pick the one for the bonnet with the most coverage as humanly possible.

The one on my car only goes up to the top edge of the hood scoop. At first that would be sufficient but I've gotten a few chips above the clear bra . I've seen one where it covers the entire bonnet. At first I thought that was a little but if I could do it all over again, that would go that route.

Thank goodness I have Langka.