Steel Soldiers now has a few new forums, read more about it at: New Munitions Forums!
Microsoft MSN, Live, Hotmail, Outlook email users may not be receiving emails. We are working to resolve this issue. Please add support@steelsoldiers.com to your trusted contacts.
I would want some assurance from the people doing the wrapping that it would get good adhesion. The bumpy chalky nature of carc doesn’t seem like a good fit with a wrap.
If I was going to do a vinyl wrap I would start with a ton of surface prep to get the paint as smooth as possible and as clean as possible. Should be a pretty simple wrap considering most of a HMMWV is flat body panels just time consuming. What are you planning on doing for a wrap? Camp or something more detailed?
Not decided yet.
Inclined to keep the camo.
Saw nice samples on web.
And that's my concern:
The vinyl last around 5 years or so.
If it is just a cleansing before apply it, ok can do. But, if needs any kind of 'smoothing', then I would think twice.
Having used some vinyl wrap on my plane, I can tell you it won't hide stuff any better than paint. If you want a smooth finish, you're going to have to prep the surface just as well as you would for paint. If there are rough surfaces, dust, cracks, etc. they'll show through way more than you would think they would.
That's a positive point for the wrapping.
If it fades or if we get tired of the color scheme, it will be easy to remove and apply another (or not) one... including the time/cost.
I don’t like the peely paint, aka plastiderp. Why paint it if you want to peel it off? It’s not durable at all. I’m thinking of a base coat paint and then patches of wrap to get camo effects. Do it myself. The material is pretty high tech and will last a long time.
Not sure the rivets will be much trouble. That vinyl stretches a lot and with heat it will pop over those. I wrapped my hood on another car and it’s pretty tricky. Takes a long time and good air temps. Honestly I can’t agine how they do whole cars so perfect like they do. But watch some YouTube’s and they have interesting tricks.
For the amount of prep required I would just go with paint or liquid roll on. If the vinyl only last five years before you have to replace it that seems like a lot of work when paint or Raptor Liner will last way longer and be stronger.