[California Hotrod]

Well I have had a "transparent bra" on my black 04 Prius for about a month. I paid 500 for it (bumper, headlights, hood, and front door edges). Here are my observations..

1. There is a different material being tested by Transparentbra.com. Its a product from a company called Lumar (I think).

2. I had the car done and was not happy with the outcome and they removed the 3M material and used the Lumar material. Black is the hardest color for them to work on but the Lumar product seems to be clearer than the 3M product.

3. I recommend that you DO NOT try to do the job yourself. It would be a total waste of time and money. I could see a lot of frustrated do it yourselfers (like myself).

4. You can see the line on the hood (within 5 feet)... especially when the car is dirty. I would hope that someone will use a wider sheet of plastic to do the whole hood at some point (though more expensive).

Overall I thought that Transparentbra.com did a very good job standing up for their work. I also had the windows tinted (using non metallic tint for the gps and cell phone reception).

I really like the tint job. It's a medium tint and I think it improves the lines of the car (of course it's in the eye of the beholder...). Check out the pictures. My garage is usually a bit cleaner though.

Todd

 

[Joel]

Yup - the new PPF from Llumar was all the rage at SEMA this year. It is supposed to be clearer, less likely to yellow, and easier to install. I tried to go this route for my car but decided to stick with 3M to keep costs down and wait till the Llumar stuff proves itself.

After about 3 thousand miles (with no PPF) the only rock damage I see is occurring on the plastic front fascia. I'm actually repairing this today by using Langka and some touch up paint - spent most of the time (an hour or so) getting the fascia absolutely clean and polishing out any road tar or bug remnants. After the touch up spots dry, I will use the Langka to smooth the paint blobs down and let everything dry overnight.

Tomorrow I'll install the 3M PPF on the bumper myself. I've had this done before and watched carefully - I've also researched install methods and learned some of the tricks of the trade. I hope it works out!

 

[efusco]

I can't imagine getting the black and NOT tinting the windows...you just have to know it will completely improve the appearance.

Thanks for the update.
--evan

 

[charlieh]

transparent bra

Since you live fairly close to me, who did your work? My '03 has picked up some chips and I would like to keep that from happening on my new '04.

 

[Joel]

I have a spare '04 Prius kit from Invinca-Shield that's unused. It's the upper and lower bumper. $138.00 is what I'm asking.

[email protected] if you are interested.