Dang, is it just me or does the MINI attract a lot of rocks on the road?

I have 5 rock chips on the front bonnet in ONE week and 3 imperfections on my windshield after TWO weeks. I just discovered a light 2 inch scratch from a rock today. When I bought my MCS, it was IMMACULATE. Now it has all these imperfections!!! :(

This is crazy and has never happened to me with any other vehicles I've owned. I don't tailgate people either, it seems like no matter how much distance I separate myself from cars, I hear the loud THUMP on my windshield from a rock.

 

My mini's picked up quite its share of chips too.Thanks to the penn road crews salt and cinder.....Mine gets alot of roof chips for some reason. im also very careful as to keep distance. I also had a evo and use that as my reminder that it could be worse. My Blue by you colored evo was a nightmare with stonechips. the fenders behind the rear door were becoming mostly primer

 

Not much you can you can do other then pay to have a Clear Bra Installed!!!

 

Some say it's the steep angle of the windshield that does not deflect rocks. Others might say it's due to the quality of the glass, or lack thereof.

 

+1 on Clear Bra - get one before your front end gets too messed up.

Coupla reasons for our rock chip issue, and they're cumulative:

1. We've got the aerodynamics of a one of these:

As a result, the rocks&grit&stuff hits directly, full force, instead of at an extreme angle where a lot of their energy remains kinetic (a "glancing blow").

2. We've got that nice, curved piece of hard steel "bonnet" instead of a urethane bumper to break the wind. With a urethane or plastic bumper, the rocks&grit&stuff simply bounce off a flexible surface with plasticized flexible paint over it - short version: It doesn't chip as easily. On the Mini they are faced with a hard substrate, so something has to give. That "something" is unfortunately the paint layer.

3. As a group, we're a little more picky about our car's appearance (YMMV).

4. As a group, we tend to drive, well, not in a sedate manner (YMMV).

Add it all up, more noticeable rock chips.

 

I have an EVO IX and I have two rock chips in nearly 3 years of ownership.

 

trust me your'e the lucky one

 

Personally, I think if you (a) actually drive your MINI and (b) like to have a chip-free appearance and (c) don't like to be doing touchup a couple of times per month then a clearbra is a MUST on these cars.

I'm at 46,000 miles, most on the highway, and have touched up maybe 4-5 tiny chips around the edges of the clearbra. Otherwise, the paint is perfect... it makes a HUGE difference. The other cars in our club that I see regularly without clearbra are a MESS - tons of chips.

 

This time of the year I usually have a couple of touch ups required after every extended highway motoring instance. There's just so much crap that gets applied to the road surfaces--the larger particles in the typical sand/salt mixture are easily kicked up by larger vehicles and trucks and are a continual hazard. I've actually changed my driving habits to try and avoid time spend in vulnerable "chip zone" traffic configurations. It's the bane of the wintertime daily driver.

I've resigned myself to the fact that a repainting will be necessary at some point. *sighs* ...shortly after which a clearbra WILL be installed.

 

I have a tiny little cling on sticker on the inside of all of my cars. MINI USA sent them to all the dealerships.

DON'T BE AFRAID OF NICKS AND DINGS. SCARS ARE SEXY!

 

I want one!

 

I have looked & I can not find another one. But I found a bunch of other cool stickers. I will start a new thread for them!

 

Okay, here is a thought. I'm totally **** about my cars. Just ask my significant other and my family. They don't even want to talk about it. I am a coach/instructor, at a not to be named, performance driving school. My 03liquidyel MCS has "1" major nick. I personally put the nick on the car moving a ladder in the garage (smooth move huh)?

To make a long story short, I stay way back from cars/trucks in front of me and actually pull to the side or slow when a big truck is coming at me or about to pass. I'm very careful not to obstruct traffic or cause "issues". My point is... "anallity".

 

+1 on the clearbra. I have it in both of my MINIs and they have had the film since new ('05 MCS got the film when it was 3 months old, '08 Clubman S got it while still parked in the showroom the day before we picked it up).

It is really money well spent. Our cars have beautiful but very soft paint jobs. Thank the EPA for our crappy water based chip prone paints. Also the upright surfaces of the car make it a prime candidate for stone chips.

I have little patience to be touching up a car. I don't mind fixing the occasional chip here and there (They will still happen regardless) but attempting to repair a case of bad front end road rash is simply beyond my desire to deal with. Oh and repainting the hood every 2-3 years is out of the question. Respray paint jobs automatically kill your resale value.

When selecting a clear bra installer go with a reputable company/individual that a) has worked on MINIs (Our cars require serious skill to properly install the film) and b) someone that will stand behind their work and film material in case problems arise.

Stay away from installers that only guarantee the material, only IF, the manufacturer of the film agrees to honor the warranty. Some of these installers do not stand behind the product they sell when problems show up. Trust me, it happened to me (Very skilled installer but turned out to be a crook in the end when he flat out refused to replace a piece of scratched film).

 

Ive got the same problem rock magnet

 

Yep, my MINI has tons of chips. I noticed the first couple a few weeks after I had purchased it and I jumped out of my skin, to put it mildly. I bought the car used, and during closer inspection, I noticed someone tried (I use that word loosely) to touch up some spots. But the color is slightly off and they're all splotchy. I swear I accumulate a new chip every day, but I just accept that it's one of the "joys" of owning a MINI. The cars are so amazing that even random pieces of debris want to get close to them. But one day I still plan on repainting the bonnet and rear bumper and installing a clear bra.

Oh, and the windshield, ugh...

 

Yeah, i just got my mini 3 months ago, a 2005 s and it was perfect paint wise a few small dings but no chips. the previous owner had it as a fair weather car i am guessing. anyway in pa here we got some ice and snow this past week. they put the largest amount of salt and cinders on the road i have ever seen. Man did i get a beatdown.i tried soo hard to avoid it but i still got hit left and right. I bet i have 20 or so small chips around the headlight area on my mini. Im not even gonna bother griping. this spring it will get repairied and clearbra put on. Just like my 2004 lancer evolution... i wish paint was as strong as it used to be on my older cars.

 

I just noticed a "star" on my windshield, day after Xmas! I've only had the car less than 1 month.

 

Got mine in the first 10 days and under 1000 miles.

Still on that same windshield, now at 47,000 miles.

But, yeah... I had a few choice words at the time...

 

Yup I had my first star crack repaired after the first 72 hours of owning the car, and the windshield replaced in the first two months. But the replacement has lasted 2 years since then.

 

Looking out my windshield now kind of reminds me of this:



No big spiders, but the tiny pits are too numerous to enumerate...

 

The glass is like butter, If you drive even close to a truck here in the UK you can hear all sorts of hell going on outside the car, I had a truck pull out in front of me about 5 months back and actually said to my passenger, here goes my windscreen, I swear to you at that exact second you could see the rock heading for the glass, it did not break but my buddy could not believe how I predicted the rock. When I went to pick mine up the dealer could not help himself as he walked past the front of the car and touched three chips on the corner of the clamshell nose...I should have asked for them to be fixed right then.

peter

 

My windshield is starting to look like the obscured glass in my bathroom.

 

I touched up the rock dings on the hood of mine this fall and learned an important lesson. Don't use primer under the Mini retouch paint - the retouch paint is acetone based, and dissolved the red led primer. Result - red Mini with acne... Several layers of retouch paint later it's not obviously spotty, but it was a pain. Was seriously considering a coat of paint-on truck bed liner on the nose.

 

What about a ding on a black roof after two months of buying my MINI

The ding is next to the rain gutter. Any solutions??