The Detail - Well, it's in the details

I am sooooo excited about my car that I am taking the liberty of posting LOTS of pictures so that you guys can see what I did and how it turned out. Here's what I had done: 1. Full buff out and detail by Lustr Auto Detailing This is what Ivan calls his "Light Polish Detail." My car didn't have a lot of deep scratches, but there were a lot of swirl marks that he took out COMPLETELY. You will be able to tell from the mirror-like pictures that I took. Cost $255. 2. Dent Removal - by Dent Magic (the guy didn't have any business cards, but he promised he would email me something.) This guy is a magician. There were 8 or more outdents in my hood. Obviously the PO wasn't careful about what he put in the frunk, and when he pushed the hood down on it, he left outward dents in the hood. This guy removed them ALL, without any damage to the paint, and left me with a hood that looked NEW. Cost $150. 3. Clear Bra installation by Umbra Window Tinting . Well, I thought that I was getting a great deal for $700. It was too great a deal. They insisted that I didn't make it clear how much of the car I wanted covered. Honestly, they ended up covering more than I I had planned, but it was probably the right thing to do. Full front and rear bumper - Full Hood - Full front fenders, both driver and passenger side - Exterior mirrors. Cost $1,000. So, that being said, here are some pictures. First pictures of the final product, and also pix of the interior.

I have, over the many years of my existence, come to realize that the size of a business' facility bears no resemblance to the quality level of their product. Ivan does a fantastic job of detailing. He is a true fanatic. You can see it in the mirror finish of the car. He is currently working out of a 2 car garage behind his house. He's starting to look for a space to house his business in the city. Certainly the location of his business had nothing to do with the quality of his work - as you can see. larry

I don't know if you have ever seen someone do Paintless Dent Removal. This is truly an art. Using a small hammer, and a variety of round tipped tools and bars that he can pry under the metal panel with, they carefully, one small tap at a time, remove just about any dent. If the paint is undamaged by the dent, you will NEVER see where the dent was - if they do it right. When Umbra looked at the hood of my car, they said, "don't you want to remove all of those dents before you pay to have a clear bra put on your hood? Because once the clear bra is in place, you can't do the dent repair." So, I said yes, send the dude over. I was a bit concerned about the price for the 5 dents I saw - the 11 dents that he saw, but I thought that his price was really reasonable for the quality of the work that he did. It is really difficult to show a before and after on this, but here's the guy in action. larry

I decided that I wanted to have a full hood coverage. It seems that no matter what part of the car you have covered, you're going to end up with rock chips just over the edge of the bra. So, I decided to cover the entire hood. They needed to order an extra wide piece of film so that they could do the hood seamlessly, so I'll have to go back in a week or two, when they get it in. In the interim, they covered the bottom third of the hood, just to protect it until the other came in. Here are some pictures of the clear bra installation. They weren't too happy about the black bumper pads on the car. It just made it that much more difficult for them. I thought about having them taken off, but then I was told that you had to remove the entire bumper to get the pads off the front. Not interested in spending a couple of hundred $$ to remove them. Here are the pix. larry

Nice job Larry. FYI-It takes about 10 minutes to remove the front bumper cover. I'll bet those bumperettes come off with one screw once you take the bumper cover off. You could probably get a couple of "bumper plugs" from Eric to fill the holes. It would really help the look of the nose.

Tim: That might be the case, but I'm committed now. Even if it took only 10 minutes to remove the cover, and a few screws to remove the bumper pads, it would cost me plenty to have them recover the entire front bumper. Not worth the expense. Also, I'm kind of a purist when it comes to things like that. This is the one visual thing that separates the 2001 Turbo from the other years. It is the "badge" that says it's a 2001. So, I really don't mind them being there. call me crazy. larry

Nice hat.

I've used painless dent removal on two cars. The way to go for dings.

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Thanks, Pete, but I wasn't fishing for a compliment on the hat. THE POST WAS ABOUT MY CAR!!! Boy, that was a lot of work to get a nod about my hat. (but I do like that hat a lot.) larry

Larry, I'm sharing your enthusiasm regarding your car. It's nice to see that you ended up with a car that puts a smile on your face and one that you are making even better than when you bought it. Thanks for sharing!

Your ride looks fantastic, enjoy putting miles on it!!

Wow: Looks fantastic, enjoy it!

Larry, looks great. Congrats again on the new ride

Love the seat backs,center console and self portrait.

Your car looks great! Nice color too.

Looks great and the price seems very reasonable for the way things turned out. How long did the detail it take?

wow - nice job

Hey Larry, congrats on the beautiful car! GR is my favorite Porsche color- my 87 930S Fauchbau was GR... I just noticed the license plate. Do you or the previous owner work for Kellogg's? Enjoy the new toy!

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I was just going to post the same Anyway Larry - wow - what a journey to find the perfect 996! congratulations and I wish those guys operated out of Boston too!

paint looks awesome ever thought of removing the nipples up front? why do so few have these?

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Larry, car looks outstanding. Some of the very best Autopian Detailers in the country run extremely small, low key operations often times operating out of their own homes. Andy

Looks good, Larry! Thanks for posting all the pictures. As others have said, love the seatbacks and center console. Nice change from the carbon console. Time to burn the roads up (as long as there is no snow!)

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The detail took between 5 - 6 hours. He has two levels of detail that are more expensive and take longer. My car only had light swirl marks. So, it didn't take more than a one step polish. He also does a two step polish, and a deep cleaning and polish. He did a black 2010 BMW M5 just before me. It looked like a black mirror when he was done. Mine is certainly going to be easier to maintain than that one. Larry

Fantastic! Love the way your car turned out.

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Sorry Larry but I couldn't help myself. It makes me chuckle when all of us (me included) really love and are proud of our cars and we take pics and you see the reflection of the guy taking the pic. You look nothing like I thought you did. Car looks fantabulous!

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Tom - Never worked for Kellogg. This has been my plate for the last 3 cars, and maybe 10 years. But it would be funny to have a Tony the Tiger decal on the bumper next to the license plate. Pete - I know what you mean - but this was a purposeful self-portrait. Hmmm, what did you think I looked like? Don't answer that!!! PP - I have thought about it on/off/on/off/on and I guess that is where it is staying. I like it because it makes the car unique, and it's original to the car. The bumper pads were only on the 2001 Turbos, from what I know, so it's just one year, and I think that most people don't like them, so they have them removed. Everyone - thanks for the many compliments on the car. I am really happy with my purchase. It looks sharp and drives like a scared puppy. Lots of fun - now, when is that next AutoX?? larry

Larry, GR8 looking ride. Enjoy and stay away from trucks

Larry Very nice work! Your TT is getting the royal treatment! Good

Beautiful job. That's the only 996 that would tempt me to turn my back on the one I have. I guess I'm bending the rules by saying this, but looking at your interior reminded me that I have a homeless set of black Lloyd mats with silver logos that would look great in there.

Looks like it was worth the wait, your new Porsche looks amazing, it's all protected and ready to go out for a long drive.

Fabulous looking P-car, and excellent work on the detail job. I've never seen clear bra wrapped around the sides and rear - do you live in a wind-blasted area? Why do they suggest wrapping anything but the frontal impact area?

Skiracer: There are a couple of things going on here. First of all, the standard front clear bra is the front bumper, the lower 1/3 of the hood, the front 1/4 of the front fenders and the exterior mirrors. I have had a number of stone chips on the middle to upper part of my hood on other cars, so I wanted them to do the full hood. Also, I don't like the line of the edge of the plastic. Considering that I'm doing the entire hood, they suggested that I might want to do more than the front 1/4 of the fender. This way, there won't be a line of plastic running across the middle of the fender. Made sense to me, so they completely covered both front fenders - both right and left. I wanted the rear bumper covered. I have had too many instances where another driver in the parking lot, or on the street, parallel parked, will try to squeeze past me while either parking or pulling into traffic. They end up scraping the paint off the corners of my rear bumper. Normally, they just cover the top of the bumper in the center, so that you don't scrape the bumper while putting stuff in the trunk or taking stuff out. (Oh, but there is no trunk in the back - it's the engine!!) Yes, I know. So, that protects the paint from scrapes and bumps in parking lots where some idiot thinks that bumpers are called that because that is their purpose - Idiots!!! Now, take that to the extreme. They tell me that they do at least one complete wrap a week. That's a $3,000 - $4,000 + clear coating that covers the ENTIRE CAR. Front and rear fenders, both doors, etc, etc. They say that it isn't unusual for someone with a Lambo, Ferarri or Bentley that wants to protect their car all the way around. I decided to not do the doors or rear fender. I tend to park in remote sections of parking lots away from traffic, and hopefully away from dings. Sometimes it's impossible to protect yourself totally, but I try. That's the long answer. larry

For those in the Chicago area, or those who are interested, I finally got some business cards in the mail from the Paintless Dent Remover. I thought I would pass on his info. I thought that the guy did a really fantastic job on my car, and one good job deserves a referral. Quality Dent Magic - Erich Pawelko - [phone removed] service at qualitydentmagic dot com. He comes HIGHLY recommended. larry

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I've had the standard front end clear bra on my last two cars. I hated seeing the line down the fenders and esp the hood. I hated it so much, I took it off my current car this past winter. If I do clear bra again, I'm covering the whole hood and front fenders just like you did. When I lived in Chicago, my bumpers also had scratches. Thankfully, Indy doesn't have a parking problem like that.

I still don't understand the high cost of clear bra. The material is not THAT expensive and the skill involved in applying it is less than a good window tint job..... maybe I'm missing something. By the way the car looks fantastic

looks great.. love those seat backs but I think you really need more CF

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Thanks for the compliment. I honestly don't know how expensive the material is, but I do know that there are a number of manufacturers of film on the market, and some is a lot more expensive than others. I know of one guy that had a clear bra put on his car, and there was so much texture in the plastic that it "ruined" the look of the car - like a heavy orange peel. So, he took it off. The film that is on my car is a high end 3M film. Beyond that, there is a considerable amount of skill in putting the film on the car. It needs to be stretched, smoothed, bubbles removed and trimmed just right. I watched him put it on my car. The entire job took 5 hours. Cost me $1,000. When I had them just do the front bumper, 1/3 hood, and front 4" of the front fenders, it was $500, and took 2 hours. In relation to what I've seen cost-wise and material quality, I am VERY satisfied with the job. larry

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I don;t think you overpaid at all as that seems to be the going rate. It's just funny that the protection costs as much or more in some cases as just respraying the front bumper every couple years

The car looks awesome! I love the CF, and I bet when not lit up by a camera flash, it looks darker and richer?

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I can vouch for him as I've known him for 10 years or something like that. He is one of the BEST paintless dent removal guys. Also if you have multiple dents on one panel, he gives very GENEROUS discounts! He used to be a Nissan guy so the more you talk to him about Nissan's, the bigger the discount. j/k

Like I had said, he removed a total of 10 or 11 dents from my hood, ranging between very noticeable to just a minor bump. The total price was $150, and he came to us!!! Hard to argue with that kind of a deal. larry

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I can't believe that. I paid some jerk $80 last summer to remove just one little ding and he didn't even do a good job. I improved on it with a chunk of dry ice, but I'm still not happy with it. I'm going to try again this spring with someone else.

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Actually $80 per dent is the going rate. Around here, they have "Hail" Packages if you have hail damage with multiple dings. Guys that have a mobile business or work out of their trucks don't have as much overhead and can sometimes give you discounts.