View Single Post
      06-14-2020, 10:38 AM   #40
argento
Captain
argento's Avatar
538
Rep
872
Posts

Drives: 2013 X5M
Join Date: Mar 2012
Location: Houston

iTrader: (0)

IMPRESSIVE. Not to take over the thread, but just to give you a small idea of the effort involved (for a novice like me)...I just wrapped all the aluminum pieces and it was TEDIOUS to get it right WITH all the trim removed. And I'll admit, I think I only got 97% of it looking how I wanted. The only piece I did in place was the glovebox trim, but I had both side vents removed and that made it much easier.

I started wrapping back in March and did just about all the pieces at least twice to get them decent. I can see doing straight lines easily, especially if you can tuck the edges down into a gap that gives way, like the edge at the top of the trim to door panel. The most important tool to me was a very sharp exacto knife, they are easy to dull the second it touches non-film. Next critical you need a heat gun. What's hard are the corners and you have to use your heat gun to stretch over and around the corner such that the tension doesn't want to unpeel the film (and there are no wrinkles). When you cut the excess you need leave enough to provide tension, but not to much that your stuff doesn't fit back in place properly. Some film stick well like 3M 2080, but I still needed a 'sealitpen' in some places. Other brands were very stiff and unpeeled quickly or needed a lot more heat...these brands you don't want to use for small parts.

In the pic below, I wrapped the shifter 4 times in carbon (non-3M, edges unraveled easily, even with sealitpen), three times in 3M gloss black. The 3M worked well each time, I just messed up twice. There are 9 wrapped pieces in the shifter shot; The shifter button surround (on left side) is also wrapped. Also hard to see is the radio console trim wrapped and the silver trim under the vents. The second shot is of the door panels and rear console. I use the putty tool to seat film in crevices.

I'm mostly done on the interior, but haven't put back the shifter console trim b/c I'm still playing around with an updated Android Monitor I just installed.

Hope to hear from some posters that are more experienced than I...

Name:  IMG_0596_resized.jpg
Views: 590
Size:  502.3 KB

Name:  IMG_0583_resized.jpg
Views: 583
Size:  258.2 KB
__________________

Last edited by argento; 06-14-2020 at 12:04 PM..
Appreciate 0