If you’ve been with the channel for a while, you’d know that I had XPEL Ultimate Plus paint protection film or PPF installed on my Supra. Well today, I want to share with you the general aftercare regimen for this product because if you’ve invested in PPF, you’ll want to make sure to treat it right to get the most out of that investment. Caring for PPF is a little different from normal paint but nothing too crazy.
First off, let’s start with the time directly after installation. You do not want to wash the PPF. From what I was told by my installer, some soaps react with the film and its adhesive and make things not bond properly. So, again, no traditional car washes.
That being said, you do want to keep the film relatively clean. Say you get the film installed and you drive home with the car on the same day or the following. The car may get a little dirty. In my case, I caught some dead bugs on the bumper. In this case, there are some products that you can use to spot clean. I personally used a Meguiar’s Last Touch Spray Detailer. As the name implies, this is a quick detailer. For those unfamiliar with this type of product, it’s essentially a slick liquid that allows you to spray on and pick up light surface contaminants without scratching the surface and without the need of soap and water. I personally use Last Touch but any spray detailer from a reputable company should suffice. I’ll leave links to the products that I use and some other options below.
Moving out of the first 48 hours, you will be able to wash your car but this is kind of dependent on your situation. If you had the PPF installed in the summer, the adhesive is going to bond quicker than if you had it installed in the winter. If you store your car in a climate-controlled environment, then it doesn’t really matter so the 48-hour recommendation should be fine. Although I had my PPF installed in the summer, I just played it safe and waited a week before doing any washing.
When you do decide to wash your car, I would personally recommend a traditional hand washing. I never recommend automatic washes as they can do some real damage to your finish and in this case, could do damage to your PPF. Again, play it safe and just hand wash.
For those who haven’t been down the rabbit hole of car shampoos, let me just tell you that there’s a lot to choose from. To keep things as simple as possible, choose a pH balanced shampoo. This means that the shampoo is neutral in the sense that it won’t degrade any protective coatings that you have on the PPF.
Speaking of which, use some kind of paint protection coating on your PPF. This can be a wax, sealant, or ceramic coating. When you get the PPF installed, it is very likely that the shop offered you some kind of coating for the film. This is a good idea as the coating will likely come with some sort of warranty so it just makes life simpler for you. However, I can completely understand that you don’t want to get the coating because these shops usually charge a lot for the service. Because I’m experienced in auto detailing, I decided to do the ceramic coating myself. For this, I went with Adam’s Graphene Ceramic Coating. I decided on this one because it has a claimed lifespan of 7 years and at the time, this was the most durable coating that I could find. This coating is also compatible with PPF and that’s obviously what we want. If you’re interested in the application process of this coating or want to see how it performs, I’ve made a whole series of videos dedicated to it and you can find those on my channel. If want to go with something else, that’s fine. Just make sure that your coating is compatible with PPF.
Now, if you are going to attempt to apply a coating to the PPF yourself, I do want to elaborate on the process because it is a bit different from normal paint. Typically, to prep for a coating, we would need to wash the car, decontaminate the surface, do paint correction if necessary, then apply the coating. I’ve already covered washing so let’s move on to decontaminating the surface.
Decontamination is usually a two-step process, chemical decontamination and mechanical decontamination. Chemical decontamination involves using an iron remover chemical to remove any ferrous metals that may be embedded in the surface. Then you move on to mechanical decontamination and use a clay media and pick up anything leftover. This process should leave the surface smooth and contaminant free. However, with PPF, we are advised to not use any harsh chemicals as it could damage the film. XPEL doesn’t say anything about using an iron remover so I would personally play it safe and skip chemical decontamination as iron removers can be quite harsh chemicals. They can damage paint if used improperly so I have a feeling that they can have some negative effects on the film. With mechanical decontamination, XPEL does explicitly state that the film can be clay barred so we’re good there. Just use some of the quick detailer mentioned earlier as a clay lube and go at it.
From decontamination, we would typically move on to paint correction and this involves using a polisher to remove any defects and to allow for the best possible adhesion of the coating to the surface. Now, I have seen people polish PPF. However, I personally do not recommend this. Paint correction is essentially abrading the defects away. On PPF, this means that that you’re abrading a microscopic portion of the film away. Now remember, XPEL films have a self-healing top layer. It’s unlikely that you’ll polish through the entire film but it may be possible for you to polish through the self-healing top layer. To repeat myself, play it safe. Don’t do anything that can negatively impact the film. It’s a one-way road. Once the damage is done, there’s no going back. So, I would personally advise skipping paint correction altogether.
So from here, we move on to the last step before the actual coating process and that is to give the surface a wipe with some isopropyl alcohol. The alcohol strips the surface of any remaining oils and residues and leaves the surface as bare as possible. The official XPEL website mentions that you can use 99% isopropyl alcohol on the film.
At this point, the film is ready for coating and I would personally say that this is absolutely necessary. If you want to maximize the life of your PPF, you should protect the film with some sort of coating. Think of it this way, the film protects your car but the film itself needs something to protect it. To be fair, you don’t have to do this. The XPEL film comes with a 10-year warranty but in my opinion, applying a coating just makes the owner’s life easier. Again it protects the film and reduces the chance of a warranty claim. But beyond that, having a good paint protection coating makes it easier to clean the film. Water, dirt, and debris do not stick as easily so the time spent cleaning the car is reduced. I like to keep my car clean so this alone makes it worth it for me.
After you get the PPF coating, it’s just a matter of periodic maintenance. Wash the car and periodically maintain the coating. The process is not all that different from paint. Just remember not to use harsh chemicals and don’t do anything that may force the edges of the film to lift. Following this guide should help you to keep your XPEL PPF in a good state for years to come.
