I have ppf on my 2013...not one nick on the paint so it is worth it to me

 

Never had PPF on any of my cars. I bought my C7 ZO6 from the original owner with 3000 miles on it. Had PPF the entire nose, mirrors and usual places.

Just bought my 2022 ELB C8 HTC from the original owner with 1000 miles on it. He paid $8000, I have the receipt, for PPF on the entire car, wheels, door sills everything then Ceramic over that. He also added side skirts, front splitter and other “upgrades” for about $7k.

I bought it for $5k under MSRP.

As I he it both guys I bought from got ZERO return on the PPF investment.

I’m on MM list for a ZO6. I will most likely not do any PPF. If I do it will only be nose and mirrors. Just not worth the money IMO.

 

What you need to decide is your car a keeper or short term? I flip cars frequently so no for me. Honestly it’s more important not to tailgate then to put on film.

 

Nope. Removing PPF leaves 2 different shades of color on your car depending on how much you drove it out in the sunlight. One time I also peeled it off and it took the clearcoat off with it. I DO put it on my commuter cars though. It saved the front of my suv when some dirtbag purposely cut me off and slammed on his brakes in front of me causing me to slide into him. The C8 will not get PPF. I just drive with paranoia and stay far far away from everyone.

 

I see a lot of cars at Cars & Coffee with PPF and they look like crap! The PPF has more mars from road rash than the unprotected ones do. The bigger issue is how and where you drive the car.....

 

With 44 opinions I will add one more. Complete waste of money. I did it one time on a BMW and the front got beat up anyway. It will not protect against the kind of road debris we have here in Louisiana apparently.

 

 

It really depends a lot on how you're going to use the car. If it's a weekend car for just casual drives around town, the occasional local back road drive, taking to shows and meets, then there's really not as much need for PPF. If on the other hand, you like to really drive the car (like I do), doing multiple long trips, lots of backroad drives as well as everything above, then PPF becomes much more attractive. The last car that I didn't do PPF on was a '13 GS, and with all of the above use, I went through having the front bumper cover repainted twice in the ~36K miles I had the car. At roughly $300-$400 a pop, it was still cheaper than PPF, but I had to live with it looking like crap until I got tired enough of it to get it repainted and then had to deal with getting the car to/from my buddies shop, being without the car for a week, etc. Almost all of the wear was from highway trips and backroad drives with buddies (following behind other Corvettes with wide tires on country backroads leads to lot of gravel/stones from two lane country blacktop being thrown up). And almost all of the wear on the C6 was to the front bumper cover and mirrors. So for the next car (C7 SR) I did PPF on just the front bumper cover and mirrors, and was very happy with the protection. On the next one ('12 ZR1), I had a buddy who cut me a deal on full front half PPF & ceramic (well worth it). Again, almost all the impacts were on the front bumper cover and mirrors, so I really could have probably skipped the hood and fenders, but it was a rare car and I wanted to protect it. On the C8, I had the museum do Xpel PPF (through a local shop), and was again going to go front half, but it wasn't much more for the Front End Plus package (which includes the lower panels along the entire sides) since I was planning on doing a road trip back from the museum (ended up doing 2300 miles). It was great because I didn't have to worry about driving it in traffic on the interstate, and it paid for itself in my mind several times on that trip when trucks and semis threw up things that I could hear impact but left no marks. I ended up being happy with the Front End Plus because the car does get a lot of rocks/stones thrown up from the tires (both front and rear) on the lower sides. The other big benefit of PPF is protecting against all the bugs & bird crap. You really don't have to worry about it as much as the film keeps all that from etching the clear coat, and you can clean it off a lot easier (microfiber and detail spray or waterless car wash for a quick wipe down without worrying about adding scratches/swirls).

Anyway, can you live without PPF? Sure, it's absolutely not required. It's really more of a peace of mind and easier maintenance. I would encourage you to at least do the front bumper cover and mirrors as that's where the majority of impacts occur. I would never recommend the half-hood kits as they look like crap as once you get a little dust/dirt on it the line shows horribly. And for those saying they like the paint shiny, good quality PPF does not reduce the shine/luster of the paint at all. Nor does good quality PPF yellow, discolor the paint underneath, or peel up the clear underneath (these may have been true of early PPFs, but not good quality PPF from the last 5-10 years).

 

I've managed all my reasonably long life with a gazillion vehicles without it; and, I'm not starting now. You asked... If YOU want it, get it. Who cares what anyone else opts for?

 

I’ve been daily driv8ng vettes for decades and I never do PPF.

im sure for many it has value just not for me.

my 34 month old 26k mile c8 looks great. I drive mine In all four seasons.

I did put the ceramic coating on the car myself and once with a friend.. that’s was easy to do and supposedly that’s the latest and greatest etc..

clean the car, wipe on a section of the car with the applicator, wipe off in under a minute making sure the applicator gets overlapping strokes of coverage..

it’s easy although some friends are still doing old school wax and their c8 s look really good too.

PPF is in my opinion an expensive pain in the butt..and it can’t stay on too long or it damages the finish..

sometimes over kill is too much. The guys who do PPF swear by it but I’m not missing it on any of my past four corvette daily drivers..cars always looked great.

jmo and good luck deciding.

 

No PPF, just Crystal Serum Light and Exo V5

 

No PPF. Ceramic coating only. Learned how to do the coating myself and it was an enjoyable experience.

 

This is my plan

 

Save Your MONEY !!!

 

An upright vacuum cleaner fell on the side of the c8 yesterday making a 2 inch long scuff. I calmly buffed out the scuff. Absolutely zero trace of it. If it had PPF, you couldn't buff that out, and you'd have to replace the whole section of PPF. Just an anecdote. I also drive it in the rain and on loose gravel sometimes. I don't tailgate.

 

Hundreds of brands out there. And your opinion of the best is??

 

You would have to have removed material from the finishing coat to level out the scuff. PPF wouldn't be so subtractive. And I've often left scratches to heal. The few times it's deep enough to not heal, I just leave it alone. Because even if battle scarred, I value its utilitarian aspect and leave it visible as a sign that it's doing it's job with the satisfaction of knowing the paint underneath is either pristine or more restorable than without. So the urge to replace the scraped PPF becomes less urgent and I've never even reached that point of replacing it. The pre-cut templates localize defects to modular pieces that are easier and cheaper to replace than, at the next to worst case, entire body panels.

 

I've never done PPF in the past, I didn't do it with my most recent Stingray, and I won't do it on my Z06 either.

It reminds me of the old people who would cover their couches in plastic lmao.

 

A better analogy to covering the couch in plastic would be a black nose mask on the front end circa 1990s. Both the sofa plastic and nose bra change the outward texture and look of the underlying thing they're protecting.

Whereas PPF is virtually indistinguishable from the underlying thing it protects. It gives the benefit of protection without the drawback of visibly altered aesthetics because it's practically invisible.

Mostly older people were into couch covers and black nose bras. Mostly younger and next gen people current with the times are into the technological material advancements made by PPF.

 

I have ppf over the entire front end of my Camaro. On a black car significant rock dings to the ppf will turn white and stick out like a sore thumb. While the paint underneath is indeed protected, until you get enough rock dings to make replacing the ppf cost-effective the dings will look like crap.

I opted not to do the ppf on my C8. I bought a Novistretch bra instead. I put it on when I feel there is a significant chance for rock chips and bug hits. Most of the time I use the bra during extended freeway driving.

I drove my C8 from Florida to Ohio back in April 2021 and didn't get a single rock chip. Had a few bug strikes above the bra but that was it.