Invest in PPF for trackdays in £80k Porsche?

[px1980]

I will at some point in 2021 take delivery of brand new Cayman GTS and intend to do at least a few trackdays in it.
Would you put PPF on the car? If so, partially or on all panels?

thanks

[mmm-five]

Are you planning on using it on gravel rally stages or going off into the kitty litter much?

It may be more useful for normal road use protection than specifically track day protection.

[ecain63]

mmm-five said:

Are you planning on using it on gravel rally stages or going off into the kitty litter much?

It may be more useful for normal road use protection than specifically track day protection.

100%!! I had put PPF on my Exige 410 (same value) and it's saved a lot of track damage as well as a lucky escape in Tesco carpark. No brainer in my opinion. I had full front end, wings, mirrors, any carbon, sills, trailing edges and rear bumper covered at £2400+vat using Xpel PPF. This included a full paint prep (detail and polish) and ceramic on top.

I was unlucky to have a guy pull out the pits and in front of me at Brands last summer, straight after he'd been in the gravel. The tit hadn't used the pit break to clear his underside and my car was battered with gravel for most of a lap until he was black flagged and I passed safely. The PPF had taken the abuse but not the paint.

Edited by ecain63 on Thursday 28th January 17:29

[mmm-five]

I recall a car dealer giving his customer a track experience in a dealer demo GT86.

To protect the paintwork, he took an industrially-sized roll of cling-film out of the boot on arrival and wrapped everything he could - with double layers on the rear wheel arches.

But that was on a rally stage part of Oulton Park.

I should probably have done the same...

[Shrimpvende]

I would on a car of that value, especially if you plan on keeping it long term.

Every time I do a full day in my Clio it ends up with at least a chip on the bonnet or front bumper somewhere, it also saw a little bit of gravel at Craner's which caused some gravel rash...a small mistake that could be laughed off in the Clio but I'd be upset if I'd done that to a brand new porker!

[_Leg_]

I have all my modern road cars covered in PPF and my Lotus Exige EX460 track car. I've had the front end of the Exige re ceramic coated on top of the PPF today ready for (every the optimist) 2021 track day season as it helps with removing rubber.

One of my road cars has had full PPF since new in 2012 (the longest) and it still looks new apart from a little shredding of the PPF on the rear of the inner wheel arches which is typical (but barely noticeable).

Track car has done 9000 miles of which around 1000 is normal road use, 3000 a road trip to Austria and 5000 track day miles. It still looks spanking new at 4 years old next month.

I've now started having my classics PPFd too as I'm sick of tentatively cleaning them to protect the paintwork. Detailer came today to make sure the paint was perfect on my nearly finished '67 Abarth 595 restoration before it goes for full PPF on Monday.

I wouldn't be without it. Helps me enjoy the cars to their full potential without worrying. The first one I did, that I mention above, has XPEL, the rest Suntec and the Abarth is going to have Hexis. I used to use Paintshield (now gone) but as I'm in York I switched to Vinyl Image (near Leeds) 3.5 years ago purely because Peterborough was too far away.

I must've spent nigh on £20k on PPF now I come to think of it. Ahh well, I could have wasted it on women and wine. Hang on, why didn't I waste it on women and wine? Oh FFS, what an idiot.

[px1980]

thanks all for replies. Sounds like this is something most agree is worth doing.

[mistercommi]

I would do it for that sort of value car. More for road use though, I get more stone chip damage driving to/from tracks on the motorways than the track itself.

[gruffalo]

My whole car is wrapped in PPF it has multiple advantages, very tough to protects from all sorts of car park dings and the like, obviously great stone chip protection but also on my car it mostly just hoses clean especially if ceramic coated.

It also give peace of mind on track when following another car.

[NIgt3]

mmm-five said:

I recall a car dealer giving his customer a track experience in a dealer demo GT86.

To protect the paintwork, he took an industrially-sized roll of cling-film out of the boot on arrival and wrapped everything he could - with double layers on the rear wheel arches.

But that was on a rally stage part of Oulton Park.

I should probably have done the same...

flip me it definitely was a rally stage!!

[bigmowley]

I have a Cayman R that had half of the bonnet PPF’d from new in 2012, bizarrely this was a thing back then.
It’s only done 20K miles from new but I have done quite a few track days as well. I had the old PPF removed, the entire car machine polished, ceramic coated and new film put on this autumn. The difference between the un-filmed part of the bonnet and the filmed part was astonishing. There were loads of tiny stone chips on the un-filmed part, the filmed part was perfect. It was so bad that I had the bonnet painted to rectify it before the new PPF was done.
Moral of story is Yes definitely get it protected.
Gratuitous pic

[Fonzey]

Would I get PPF on that car? Probably yeah. Would I get it specifically for trackdays? I don't think so - I've never knowingly got stonechipped on track, much more likely for it to happen on the way to or from the circuit IME!

Hitting cones is another matter entirely though

[mmm-five]

Fonzey said:

Hitting cones is another matter entirely though

...and definitely don't hit cones that the circuit owner has bolted into the ground

[Fonzey]

mmm-five said:

...and definitely don't hit cones that the circuit owner has bolted into the ground

Maybe if they PPF'd the cones we could all save our money?

[mmm-five]

Fonzey said:

Maybe if they PPF'd the cones we could all save our money?

Maybe make the gravel out of softer materials too?

[Far Cough]

Get it done 100% and try and get it done at the dealer ( not necessarily BY the dealer) so that you have the protection immediately before getting on the road.

You can get trackday wrap designed for a single day that you slap on and peel off after but it looks a bit naff ......

[ecain63]

I mentioned this incident in an earlier post:

Grey M2 exits the pits. It's immediately obvious that the nugget hasn't cleaned the gravel out from the underside of his car when he went back in for his bking. I do my best to stay out the way of the flying stones and even with flashing lights the guy doesn't indicate to let me past, instead he's accelerating and following the racing line. For a full lap he's seemingly oblivious to this or he just doesn't care. He at one one point does indicate but I'm not into overtaking on corners, especially as he's made no attempt to let me through on the out-lap and any gap I thought i had has been met with acceleration and not backing off to let me through. I even had to touch the grass to avoid the bouncing stones on the start straight. At that point he's black flagged for the stones and we all get on with the rest of the day. The damage to my car was a bent grille, some scarring to the PPF and some chips on the windscreen. There would have been paint damage if it weren't for the PPF.

https://youtu.be/KthA9ew-c5A

[hodgre]

done a number of trackdays in 718 Boxster over three years without any obvious signs on paintwork. Get rubber marks on front, bottom third of bonnet and just in front of rear wheel arch which cleans off. Lots of break dust on wheels which takes time to get off though.

[Tommie38]

I’ve had issues where I come up behind somebody who wants to be a hero and subsequently goes off, throwing stones or debris onto the track and your car.

If somebody appears in your mirrors and they weren’t there before, move over, because they are probably faster than you...

Edited by Tommie38 on Sunday 28th February 07:49

[wannabe-racer]

Tommie38 said:

If somebody appears in your mirrors and they weren’t there before, move over, because they are probably faster than you...

Edited by Tommie38 on Sunday 28th February 07:49

Very wise words. I find most do move over, I even have people indicating out of the way on long bends at places like Coram at Snetterton - I generally don't overtake places like that though as it doesn't feel safe.