PPF removal-- you've got to be kidding me

I knew my 360 had some old PPF on the front bumper and rocker panels. I have been down this road before with my 911 rear fender flairs. Removing this stuff is ridiculously time consuming. And now (using an upholster's industrial steam machine) I am finding out that this PPI cannot even be peeled off anymore. It simply and completely disintegrates into a gooey mess.

Take this as a cautionary tale. If you have this on your car. Remove it at least every 3 years. This stuff was on my 360 when I bought it. Never again will my 360 have PPI on it anywhere.

This is so bad, I'm actually considering buying a new front bumper. It took me 45 minutes to remove 3 square inches and at this rate it will most likely become a 40 to 60 hour (tedious and exhausting) experience to remove it ALL from my front bumper alone.

Like I said... just a warning to those out there that have PPI on their cars.

 

I can more easily deal with the paint chips. I have a shop and I build high end cars... I know a guy (Ha!) that is an expert painter

 

The paint coming up with the PPF can be a concern. I've changed out my clear PPI "spats" on my 911 cars through the years and haven't encountered that. But I have heard of paint coming up with the PPI removal process. Sometimes I wonder if those cars are ones that have had paint repairs on which the body panel was not properly prepared. I once had a gentleman in my shop that saw how we taped the edges of the doors, hood, fenders, etc. during final assembly of a car we painted. He asked: "Don't you worry about that tape taking off paint when it's removed?" My reply: "Not any paintwork that comes out of this shop I don't"

Your comment about wrapping your couch reminded me of my first car. I had the seats redone in white vinyl. My mom said that I should put seat covers on them to keep them nice. My Dad and I looked at each other and he said "what's the sense in that? Just enjoy it"

 

Nope. Mine looks fine but the steamer only softens the stuff. You can't get and edge and peel it off. It simply just crumbles as if it is all just adhesive. Probably an inferior product. I've never had that happen before and I've removed PPI before. Plus a steamer is the way to go.

 

This is what I'm dealing with. The section pictured took about an hour. No peeling just steamer and scraping. Seems like the PPF is very thin.


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I agree. The hood had a strip of about 18" up from the front edge of the hood as well as a piece around the headlights about 4" from the top of the headlight back onto the fender. I used my steamer and it peeled off in small pieces but still a manageable job. Not like this stuff on the front bumper. Definitely two different products. Don't know why that would be. Obviously what was applied on the hood was not the same stuff that was applied on the bumper. Car had only 24K miles on it when I bought it. It's been garage kept since I've owned it.
Definitely in for a really exhausting time consuming job.