Coupe Body Road Rash

[Alan_C]

I ordered my coupe kit last month. I was looking at the POM winners car and the paint is perfect, but does it stay that way? I had a MK4 and the front edge of the rear fender flare took a huge beating. I made carbon fiber look spats from 3M vinyl wrap material and they still took a beating especially anywhere the spats left uncovered.
Question, does the coupe suffer the same kind of damage as the roadster? If so, it would appear that some clear vinyl wrap material would help preserve the paint. What have others done if it is necessary?

[edwardb]

I have XPEL behind the front and rear wheels. The one in the rear is especially large since the body tucks under quite a bit. Both have taken a bit of a beating in four seasons, but not terrible. Nowhere near needing to be replaced yet. The front curve of the pipes takes some damage but that's to be expected. My Roadsters did the same thing. Not much you can do with that. I had a few stone chips on the nose during the first season, which I fixed, but not much since. There are a few marks around the lips of the wheel wells in both front and back. But again not terrible. In general, I find the Coupe takes far less damage than my Roadsters. Especially in the front. I'm guessing the more aerodynamic shape definitely helps.

[David Williamson]

In pictures you don't see all the small stone chips unless the pictures are close up. I had mine 100% clear wrapped but the main areas are the hood, behind the front wheels under the side pipe exits, the back vertical section near the side pipe exits, behind the rear wheels and the lower area of the inside of the doors (people hit it with their feet getting in and out of the car) I have 1 good rip in the wrap on the hood that I hope did not damage the paint, I will have to replace a section of the wrap to see it.
David W

[Rsnake]

If you run sticky tires it's going to get beat up in all the places David mentioned. My 200 tw autocross tires toss rocks like crazy and you can hear them hitting on the aluminum so you can only imagine what the painted areas are dealing with. I figure I can just re paint those areas every couple of years. The curved exhaust area behind the front wheels gets pitted really bad and I need to repaint it every 6 months. Cheap vht spray can In white.

[edwardb]

If you run sticky tires it's going to get beat up in all the places David mentioned. My 200 tw autocross tires toss rocks like crazy and you can hear them hitting on the aluminum so you can only imagine what the painted areas are dealing with. I figure I can just re paint those areas every couple of years. The curved exhaust area behind the front wheels gets pitted really bad and I need to repaint it every 6 months. Cheap vht spray can In white.

And right there you see the difference between a Coupe that runs auto cross, speed events, sticky tires, etc. and mine that’s basically 100% street driven with more conservative tires. Some similarities, but not the same answer for everyone.

[David Williamson]

And the roads are different in each area so how bad the stone chips are will also be different.. Where I live in Alberta they put tar and stone chips on the roads to repair them so on a daily driver car a windshield is a service part. If you get a year on one before it is cracked you are doing well, most of us drive with cracked windshields because glass insurance is the cost of a replacement each year.
David W

[Alan_C]

I am going to run the Continental ExtremeContact 02 tires which have a treadwear rating of 340, higher than most extreme performance summer tires. They will be sticky, but not 200 TW sticky.
Roads are decent here, but our driveway are gravel. I imagine I will pick up some gravel entering and exiting the garage. I am replacing the driveways with a special gravel called ABC with calcium. It has some lime in it too and hardens once compacted and wet down. I am hoping that the new surface will be better than the old standard gravel.