Porsche 991 Vinyl Hood Wrap Removal

The other day I removed the 3M vinyl wrap from the hood of my 2014 991 C4S...  Created a short, "fast-forward" video for my YouTube channel (GTSilver - Please follow!).

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DIY: Porsche 991 911 C4S Vinyl Hood Wrap

Well honestly, before I go any further, let me say that this is going to be more of a "review" rather than a true DIY.  Yes, I'll explain how I went about wrapping the hood of my 2014 991 C4S -- but I won't show you step-by-step pictures.  I was considering this to be a "dry-run" as I have never wrapped the hood of the 991 before, and I really wasn't sure that I would want to post anything about it if I failed....

Well, as you can see from the following pics, I didn't "fail."  Seriously, you would have to get pretty darn close-up to my hood to see the telltale signs of an amateur job.  Amateur?  Yes, I have to admit that despite the countless hours of practicing on various objects, wrapping other parts of the car (including the roof panels), I don't feel that I could claim that I am wrapping at a professional level.  More on that later....

Here's what I did:  I ordered-up some 3M 1080 vinyl wrap in Matte Black.  I wanted to match the roof vinyl that I applied a while back.  Having a 'free' Saturday night, I decided last night to do the wrap.  The conditions weren't that great.  The weather here in PA has been cold, and even with the warmer temperatures the previous day the temp in my garage was about 43 F at the car level.  I do have a construction propane space heater, but literally ran out of propane in the tank minutes after firing it up.  But I decided to do the project anyways.  So I cranked up some music, got a beer, and started the prep work.

I had thoroughly hand-washed the car the day before.  It is very clean...  But I then worked the hood with a clay bar to get the surface super-smooth in prep.  After claying, I rubbed-down the surface with a prep solution.  Afterward, I opened the frunk and removed the hood badge.  This was the first hour of my project.

With the surface ready, I then checked the temperature at the hood surface.  I was still on the fence about whether I should ditch and wait for warmer weather...  It too read out at 43, so I continued.  My next dilemma was what to do about the Xpel front-end wrap that was already in place.  My car came from the dealer with a partial front-end wrap, so the hood has a line across it about midway.  This is barely noticeable on my GT Silver car, but of course putting the matte black vinyl on top of it would make the line stand-out much more.  But at the same time I didn't feel like peeling it off as I was pretty-sure that I would probably pull the black vinyl off anyways, and didn't want to leave my front-end unprotected ( I drive this car almost daily).  So the decision was to wrap right over the Xpel.

I placed the 5'x6' vinyl out over the hood, face-down.  I am doing the wrap on my own, so I would have to work the vinyl a bit at a time and use tape to hold it in place at times....    With the vinyl face-down, I first cut the larger piece into a shape roughly outlining the overall shape of the hood, but with enough vinyl around all edges to work with.

I then flipped it over, and taped it in place.  Then, I pulled the vinyl and backing down carefully towards the nose of the car overlapping, stopping about half-way down.  With the paper backing exposed, I peeled it off and cut it away.  Then carefully placed the sticky vinyl area back into previous place, touching in a few spots to set it in place.  I could then start working the top areas of the hood up to the windshield edge to remove all air, wrinkles etc.  This went extremely well and was very easy.  Looked perfect and not a single hint this was installed by me... !

Once that section was done, I pulled the vinyl near the nose of the car up and overlapped the area I just finished.  I pulled the paper backing off and carefully pulled the sticky vinyl down to the nose.  This didn't go as well as the upper portion of the hood.  As the hood slopes towards the nose, it is also curving a bit, and the vinyl was not cooperating.  I had some "wrinkles" and other issues in the surface.  BUT, I found that this is where patience paid off.  I simply applied heat, and working in smaller sections at a time slowly worked all of the issues out of the vinyl until I found myself at the front edge.

I used my heat gun to continue working-out any bubbles or bumps in the hood, until it all appeared perfect...  Now I turned my attention to the edges and trimming.  I slowly went over the entire hood edge, working the vinyl over and under the edge.  I then got my knife and began slowly trimming the excess vinyl off.  By far the trickiest area to work on were the two corners of the hood at the windshield.  There wasn't much clearance to work the vinyl from underneath, and the corners are very pointed in shape.  In the end I got it done simply "ok."  I will want to redo that area no doubt.

I also had some trouble in couple of areas where I trimmed a bit too much away, and the wrap didn't come far enough under to be consistent.  I don't see the edges of the hood, but looking at the edges when the hood is open you can see the problem.  I am too anal to let that go....

And basically that is it!  I finished.  Took me about 2 hours and 45 min, including the prep work.  I put the badge back on, and went back over everything with my fingers, squeegee and heat gun to make sure I didn't overlook anything.

Here are my pics taken the day after...

I am not going to show you a picture of the underside of the hood...  like I said, the trimmed edge didn't come out as perfect as I expected, so I will need to spend more time on that aspect of the project next go-around.  Which I plan to do.  In the next few weeks...  LOL.

Needless to say, I am very happy how this turned-out.  I had my brother-inlaws both inspect the work in the daylight today, and they literally didn't notice anything until I pointed it out.  Like the line across the middle of the hood where the Xpel film ends.  Or the small creases up under the edge near the windshield.  They had no idea this was vinyl until I told them.  So that made me happy!

Stay tuned, I am going to re-do the hood, and may just tackle other parts of the car soon!

DIY: Porsche 991 911 C4S Roof Wrapping

Some time back I decided to add some unique style to my 2014 911 GT Silver C4S.  Among other things, I changed the chrome accents / badging to matte black, changed the headlights out to OEM Black PDLS units, changed the entire exterior mirror assemblies to matte black, and so on.

Additionally, I decided to change the entire roof to matte black, using vinyl wrapping material.  I didn't get a good set of pictures throughout the installation process, but will post here what I do have...

I chose to use a 3M 1080P product, which for those of you who aren't familiar is an automotive vinyl wrapping material that is very durable, easily installed, and completely removable without negatively impacting the OEM painted surface.  I had read a ton of articles on vehicle wrapping, and my opinion is that 3M manufactures one of the better-quality, "higher-end" materials for wraps.

I ordered the vinyl material online from a reputable 3M vinyl supplier, along with some basic application tools such as surface prep, squeegee, and blades.  I don't remember the exact cost, but I think for the surface area I am dealing with I spent about $75.

Here's a "before" picture - not the best view, but clearly shows the three sections of the roof that I had to deal with in my case (obviously, is you have the 'no-sunroof' option, you will only have one large surface to cover....).

My '14 C4S roof includes the metal sunroof panel, so my roof is 3 separate areas.

To get started, make sure the  car is very clean, focusing on the surface area you are going to cover.   I did my usual wash routine, then used some cleaning solution to thoroughly remove any oils, grease, wax or other residues from the surface.  If your car roof is "dirty" you may also want to clay bar the surface -- in my own case I didn't feel this was necessary as the surface felt very smooth and "slippery" to the touch.  Wouldn't hurt to clay anyways, but I decided not to.

You should also make sure to get the area completely dry, paying attention to the areas where moisture might remain for an extended period, such as around the weatherstripping....  I used a air hose from my compressor to blow the water out of the cracks around the area.

 The next step -- and although some may feel this is not necessary -- is to remove any exterior trim, which in my case meant the weatherstripping / rubber gaskets that run along the roof edge as well as around the metal sunroof on my car.  I found that the stripping is actually 5 separate parts -- there is a single 'box' of weatherstripping surrounding the sunroof panel, as well as 4 smaller segments - 2 on each side, front and back, where the stationary sections of the roof meet-up.

I started with the rubber stripping around the sunroof.  I found that this is a single large / continuous rubber piece, a square...  I opened the sunroof, and began at a corner.  Gently pull the rubber up and it should start sliding off as you work around the perimeter of the sunroof.

Start pulling-up at the corner of the sunroof panel.

Be careful, and try not to stretch the rubber too much.  It does deform, but you can totally reuse this piece as I'll mention later.  I am not sure what the price is to replace, and it shouldn't be too bad, but if you are careful and take your time you shouldn't have to worry about it.

Pull-up carefully around the perimeter of the sunroof.

Once I had the rubber gasket removed, I found a nice safe place and put it aside.  I then turned to the 4 smaller rubber strips at the front and rear of the "side rails" along the roof.  Note that this is also the area where you would install the footings for a roof rack.  At first I was thinking that these rubber pieces would come off similar to the rubber running around the sunroof.  But that was not the case....

These rubber sections are anchored much more "permanently" than the sunroof gasket, and in fact I can confirm that these are intended to be replaced entirely upon removal.  I confirmed by looking-up the Porsche PIWIS official workshop manual article.  That would be "WM 605419 Removing and installing seal for roof assembly" for those that care....

You gently pull-up on one end of the rubber seal, and then you'll have to cut-off and remove any plastic bits that remain.  So, I didn't do this!  LOL.  I was worried about cutting something important, so I merely pulled the piece up and positioned out of the way while I worked in that area.

Red arrows indicate front of roof above windshield where I pulled-up the rubber weather stripping.

Each of the strips pull-up at one end, but are secured in place by a plastic fastener that unless you do want to clip off and replace you should take care to not tear or deform.

This is a close-up of the rear roof area, just above rear window...

With that taken care of, I again made sure all moisture was removed from the areas where the rubber gaskets are.

My next step was to lay-out some knife-less tape where I wanted to trim and tuck the black vinyl.  The piece of vinyl was already the best size -- that being a 5' x 4' single sheet.  I decided to use the knife-less tape so that I could avoid any risk of putting scratches in the paint around the roof when trimming the vinyl to three sections.

This method is also great if you don't want to remove the rubber gaskets...

Make sure to leave enough tape sticking-out so you can easily grasp and pull once the vinyl is down.

Make sure to overlap the tape so that you can "cut" the longer
side rails first, then the perpendicular shorter sides second.

Once all the tape is laid-out, you can get ready to place the vinyl.  Unfortunately I did not keep the pictures I snapped while working on this part of the project.  Sorry!  I'll do my best to describe the effort....

If you ever watch the thousands of YouTube videos out there for vinyl wrapping, you'll notice that in most cases roof wraps are put in place by at least two guys, maybe more.  But I am here to tell you that you can do it with a single person, or one set of hands!

I took the vinyl piece, and leaving the backing-paper in place laid it out over the roof.  I then started at the front and pulled the backing half-way towards the rear of the roof.  I pressed-down in a couple of spots near the middle.  As I did this, I began moving my squeegee evenly around the vinyl in a center to front pattern to firmly set the vinyl in place.  I continually worked the squeegee to remove any bubbles or wrinkles from the vinyl, progressively pressing more firmly as I worked the entire area.

Once I felt that I had done enough on the front-half, I reached under and pulled the remaining backing off.  I then started near the center of the roof and while pulling the vinyl taught towards the rear windows began working the squeegee to press the vinyl onto the roof.

I have to say that this was a really simple procedure once I got going.  Just take your time, hold the squeegee at the right angle to the surface and pay attention to detail!  I spent maybe 45 minutes tops getting the vinyl down.  In comparison, I spent nearly two hours prepping for this moment!

Once I finished, I let the surface rest for a bit.  Had a beer, or two.  I then went to the knife-less tape "ends" and started firmly pulling to create my cut lines.  This was a bit tricky at first, but you just have to firmly yank the sting to get the first cut line started.  If you laid-out the tape correctly, you should have a very nice straight line following the gaps around the sunroof and rails.  You can go back around and just yank the tape remnants out from under the vinyl.  This is easy....

Next step is to begin tucking the edges of the vinyl wrap down into the sides of the sunroof / roof panels.  If you've removed the weather stripping / rubber gaskets, this is very easy.  Just take your teflon squeegee and fingers and firmly push the edges down.  If you've cut properly, there should be plenty of material to attach so you won't have any edges exposed to the elements.  You could also use an edge sealing fluid to more firmly bond the edges to the roof, but I felt that tucking the edges under the weatherstripping should be sufficient.

Here's a pic of the front section after I've tucked the vinyl and replaced the rubber strips...

Follow the same to complete all edges around the roof, and replace any weatherstripping once you are satisfied you have a good bond at the edges.

Boom! You are done!  If all went smoothly, you should have a great-looking wrapped roof panel!

This is an "older" after-shot back in warmer weather and before
I changed to the black mirrors....

Next up?  I am going to wrap the frunk hood in either same matte black or may try something very different and go with a matte blue metallic!  

Thanks for reading!!!