So, ive read the hype. And a lot of articles and posts.
However, i have found very little on removing it after a few years, how it holds up over multiple seasons on a track car, what its like to deal with when repairing accident damage, etc.
After plastidip experiences, im super hesitant to even think about wrapping it.
Whats the story?
Just like anything prep work is key.
I have seen them last 10 years, or look like junk in a year. Prep it well, buy quality product, and 8-10 years with mainenance is easy. Accidents are not an issue, you just re-wrap that panel again.
If professionally done, locally bottom end is $3800-$4500, and high end is $10-$15k.
Good luck.
I was about to suggest Plasti-Dip, then I remembered how passionate you are in your hatred of it.
I remember Hotrod wrapping a convertible Impala with a custom wrap and saying how it was about $3,000 when they were all done. Ouch. But that was a custom wrap done by a professional, about 20 yara ago. Things may have changed.
If this this is for the MoCar, I'd squirt it in DP-90 black primer for a War Boys vibe till I figured out a paint plan.
In reply to Appleseed :
It is for the MoCAR. And it will be receiving grey dp90 initially. Mostly so you and the other photosmashers can do your good deeds and sway me.
However, things like the old 90s hks livery vinyl wrap, taping up a tubeframe for shooting paint, buffing, etc are making me look at expanding my horizon.
We had one done professionally for the 2011 Targa Newfoundland. I don't know exactly what vinyl they used. It was used for track work after that as well as R&D and driving and shows. It started to show some damage along the bottom of the front bumper after a few years. We peeled it off in 2018 or so. The paint underneath was in perfect shape and it came off well. That experience was great. I think it might have been $1k to get it done but I know we got a great price because a shop was trying to get into the business.
A coworker also wrapped his wife's car with a satin finished Oracal (I think) vinyl about 10 years ago, then took absolutely no care of it. It sits outside in our high UV environment and the vinyl has burned. It looks terrible. I don't know if it could be peeled because the car had very bad paint underneath. Satin takes more care. I think he spent around $300, but based on that and some other cars we played with I'd stay away from Oracal.
We also wrapped a car with 3M vinyl in 2019. Cost us about $2500. It's been holding up well despite some long distance drives, but we do keep it inside and care for it well. 3M will send you a swatch book if you ask, and their stuff lays down so much better.
I can tell you that removing "7 year" vinyl after 25 years involves power tools.
Mine is getting wrapped in 2 weeks. Going that route because its less work than a paint job. Especially if you're wanting to get fancy with it.
Some parts of my car have been wrapped for 3+ years now. Holding up pretty good IMO. Typical life expectancy is 5-6 years before it starts not looking great is what I hear. I don't know about removing it but when the time comes I won't care because whats underneath isn't great in my case. Wrap guy tells me all the body needs to be is smooth for the wrap to look good. So some places I'm stripping the paint off and feathering the edge in others. He told me some rattle can primer on bare metal is plenty good enough for the wrap to go over.
As for taking it off later...It can't hardly be any worse than the hours of physical work I put in just to strip the lower 10" of primer/rust protect/paint/bondo/primer/paint on my car in order to fix/prep it for the wrap. And that was with a surface prep/stripping power tool.
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