I wanted to get a consensus from other owners who have black cars. This is something that has been slowly getting worse and worse for a while now, but it finally came to a head today.
If you check out my previous post history, my Model S has required a couple visits to the service center to take care of little issues here and there. I recently came to the realization that there is nothing else pending on my list. I now deem the car to be in the condition I should have received it in from the factory 10 months ago. I'm not mad, its been a fun time, service center is great, yada yada yada, you all know that.
The car was recently detailed at the service center and ended up looking like a million bucks when it was done. The guys did a fantastic job. Not that I don't take care hand-washing it, but they have the equipment to do it right. This is probably the first time it's been detailed this well, it usually just gets washed by myself or the service center. So I go home and admire the car in the sunlight and I started to notice just how bad the hood looked when it was clean (I'd always chalked the blemishes up to dirt, bugs, my poor washing ability, etc.). But I have chips everywhere and most of them go right down to the aluminium. They are too deep for touch-up paint, so I make a few phone calls and I found the number of a body shop locally that has done complete re-paints to Model S' to give them unique colors. Apparently they do such a good job, they are the place to go if you have a Tesla.
They take a look at the hood and are shocked it's only seen 10 months of life. I ask them if they will put a better clear-coat on if they repaint it so it won't look like this again in another 10 months and they tell me that they put the same BASF30 clear-coat that Tesla and Mercedes do, and it's not supposed to look like mine does, ever. They go on to say the only time they see a clear coat not hold up this bad is when it's not given proper time to cure. And guess what, I just so happened to be on the receiving end of the new production line rush last fall.
So, all that to say this, I'm a wear and tear guy, things are meant to get used. I have 29,000 miles right now and the car, as far as the actual driving part, it has done so faithfully every time I needed it to. I get it, that it's not supposed to look new forever. I know there have been discussions on the paint being particularly soft, and I have the micro-swirls to prove it everywhere. However, I can see the bare metal on mine. I personally don't like saying this and to my knowledge have never said this, but this is a $100K car and in this particular instance (mind you I've put up with a lot), I don't think a car in this price-range should have paint chipping like this after less than a year. I wanted to get some other feedback on the paint holding up under similar duration and color for other owners.
Thanks ahead of time.
If you check out my previous post history, my Model S has required a couple visits to the service center to take care of little issues here and there. I recently came to the realization that there is nothing else pending on my list. I now deem the car to be in the condition I should have received it in from the factory 10 months ago. I'm not mad, its been a fun time, service center is great, yada yada yada, you all know that.
The car was recently detailed at the service center and ended up looking like a million bucks when it was done. The guys did a fantastic job. Not that I don't take care hand-washing it, but they have the equipment to do it right. This is probably the first time it's been detailed this well, it usually just gets washed by myself or the service center. So I go home and admire the car in the sunlight and I started to notice just how bad the hood looked when it was clean (I'd always chalked the blemishes up to dirt, bugs, my poor washing ability, etc.). But I have chips everywhere and most of them go right down to the aluminium. They are too deep for touch-up paint, so I make a few phone calls and I found the number of a body shop locally that has done complete re-paints to Model S' to give them unique colors. Apparently they do such a good job, they are the place to go if you have a Tesla.
They take a look at the hood and are shocked it's only seen 10 months of life. I ask them if they will put a better clear-coat on if they repaint it so it won't look like this again in another 10 months and they tell me that they put the same BASF30 clear-coat that Tesla and Mercedes do, and it's not supposed to look like mine does, ever. They go on to say the only time they see a clear coat not hold up this bad is when it's not given proper time to cure. And guess what, I just so happened to be on the receiving end of the new production line rush last fall.
So, all that to say this, I'm a wear and tear guy, things are meant to get used. I have 29,000 miles right now and the car, as far as the actual driving part, it has done so faithfully every time I needed it to. I get it, that it's not supposed to look new forever. I know there have been discussions on the paint being particularly soft, and I have the micro-swirls to prove it everywhere. However, I can see the bare metal on mine. I personally don't like saying this and to my knowledge have never said this, but this is a $100K car and in this particular instance (mind you I've put up with a lot), I don't think a car in this price-range should have paint chipping like this after less than a year. I wanted to get some other feedback on the paint holding up under similar duration and color for other owners.
Thanks ahead of time.