Did you know that the first car was invented as early as 1886? Since then, people have tried to come up with different ways to protect the paint on their cars. In the early days, people tried to slather animal fat on the surfaces of their cars in order to protect the paint, but, as you can imagine, this didn’t work all that well.
Fortunately, today’s technology has provided us with an ideal solution: ceramic coating for cars. A ceramic car coating is one of the most durable car coating options out there. While there are many other types of vehicle coatings on the market (some of them much cheaper than a ceramic coating) you will still find that, at the end of the day, a ceramic coating will give you the protection you’re looking for.
Keep reading and learn more about what a ceramic car coating is and how much it costs.
What Is a Ceramic Coating for Cars Exactly?
A ceramic coating for cars is really nothing more than a thin layer or two applied to your car’s paint. However, you might be surprised to discover that this thin layer of coating can make a world of difference when it comes to protecting your car. You can easily see the difference between cars that are uncoated compared to cars that have a fresh new coat of ceramic coating.
In particular, uncoated cars tend to sustain damage to their paint at a much faster rate. Paint damage has many different causes. For example, a tree branch might scratch your car door, another car might scratch your car, and the sheer power of the sun might slowly strip away your car’s clear coat and paint.
The sun in particular is a big culprit when it comes to paint damage on cars. If you’ve ever seen a car with splotchy, dull paint, that’s because the owner left the car out in the sun for far too long. The sun’s UV rays have the ability to break apart the molecules that hold together your car’s clear coat and paint job.
Paint Damage and Ceramic Coatings
Once the sun starts to break down your car’s surface, the color of the car will start to become dull and chipped. If you care about the appearance of your car, this, of course, is the last thing you want to happen to it. A ceramic coating can solve this problem along with many other car paint problems.
A ceramic coating has the ability to reflect the sun’s damaging rays. Of course, this doesn’t mean that you should leave your car sitting out in the sun for hours at a time, but the coating will certainly prevent your car’s paint from getting dull and discolored. Besides the sun, a ceramic coating will also protect your car against water spots, bug splatters, bird droppings, mud, and more.
That’s because a ceramic car coating is extremely hydrophobic. Whenever moisture hits the surface of the car, it will roll off without any effort. This is the case with mud and other materials as well.
For that reason, you won’t have to deal with any water spots and you won’t have to scrape any insects off of the front of your car either. If anything does manage to stick to your car, you should be able to wipe it off without any problem. While this all sounds great, what should you know about the cost of this car coating?
What Determines the Cost of Ceramic Coating?
When it comes to vehicle coating, there are many things that can change the pricing. While a ceramic car coating offers endless benefits to those who purchase it, the reason why many people don’t have this coating is because of the price. To have a professional apply a ceramic coating to your car, you will need to expect to pay several thousand dollars.
The average range is between $1,500 and $3,000. However, you might have to pay more than that if your car is particularly large or if you are going to very high-quality professionals. Whatever the case, paying for a ceramic coating can be a large investment and not everyone might be willing to make it.
But what factors, in particular, can change the price range for a ceramic car coating? One of the reasons why the cost of a ceramic coating might be on the higher side for you is that your current car paint needs to be touched up by professionals. Why is this necessary, you might ask?
You cannot apply a ceramic coating to a car that doesn’t already have a perfect or near-perfect paint job. This is because if the paint has any chips, cracks, or other imperfections, the ceramic coating will not be able to create a good seal over your entire car. Of course, the last thing you want to do is pay for a ceramic coating only for it not to be as effective as you thought it would be.
The Details
To make sure that the coating you get is perfect, the professionals you hire will first need to go over your entire car and make sure that the paint job is perfect. This, of course, will take extra time and labor which translates to more money out of your pocket. If your car is relatively new or has been repainted, you won’t have to worry too much about the professionals fixing any minor details on your car’s paint.
But that still doesn’t mean that the professionals will be able to go straight to applying the ceramic coating. Even if your car is covered in new paint, the paint job might still not be pristine enough to apply a coat of ceramic coating. The professionals will still need to wash down the entire car to make sure that there are no specks of dirt that might get in the way.
If there is dirt left over once the ceramic coating is put on, that dirt will remain visible for as long as the ceramic coating lasts which can be years and years. After the washing is done, the professionals will still need to polish the car before putting on the coating.
Polishing the car will make sure that the car’s paint looks positively radiant before applying the coating. That way, the car’s color will shine all the brighter once the coating is on. Keep in mind that this will all take several hours of work before the professionals even have the chance to touch a cask of ceramic coating, especially if paint correction is necessary.
The longer the whole process takes, the more money you will need to spend.
How to Save Money When Getting a Ceramic Coating
If you’re on a tight budget, spending so much money on a ceramic coating may not be an attractive prospect for you. Does this mean that you have to give up on getting your car a sleek layer of ceramic coating altogether? Not necessarily.
There is a cheaper option for getting a ceramic coating and that is to do it yourself. However, you should only do this if you are already familiar with the process of polishing and car detailing. Otherwise, you might mess up the entire job and your car will look much worse as a result.
There are many DIY ceramic coating kits that you can buy in stores or online. They are much cheaper than the professional alternative, but there is a downside: DIY ceramic coatings are nowhere near as high-quality as professional coatings.
For that reason, a DIY coating might only last you a year while a professional coating will last you several years.
How to Maintain a Ceramic Coating
You already know about the advantages of having a ceramic car coating, but how should you maintain the coating once you have it? The best thing you can do is wash your car regularly.
This will help keep the coating in great condition and it will prevent anything from sticking to it and damaging the coating over time.
Washing your car by hand is your best bet. Drive-through car washes are too harsh and can strip the coating off of your car if you go through them all the time.
When washing your car, you will want to use a pH-neutral shampoo or soap.
This will also keep the coating in good shape.
All About Ceramic Coating for Cars
If you’re looking for a good way to protect your car’s paint, a ceramic coating for cars is your best bet. It can protect against everything from scratches and sun damage to insect splatters and mud.
To learn more about ceramic coatings, check out our website here.