Clear bra experiences on a race car?
 

What have your experiences been with clear bra? I'm trying to decide if I want to put it back on....

I'm doing some bodywork freshening on my car, and have removed the clear bra that was placed on the bumper, forward 1/2 of the hood and fenders, and wheel arches. It's been on since atleast 2009 when I bought the car.

It's been a big time sink removing it! The parts the took the most abuse were super thin and pitted. Some of the stuff that was covered by the stripe was thicker and came off easier. I watched a lot of youtube videos on removal, and the best method I found was starting with the corner of a plastic razor blade, and pulling at a 30 deg angle, or a 150 deg angle. Heat helped in some areas, but not others. Adhesive was left behind more on the steel panels and CF, almost none on the plastic bumper. The adhesive removal is my next phase. I've tried goof off with little success, soaking 3m adhesive remover wth saran wrap over it (still dried). Best try was lots of adhesiver remover and plastic razor blade, but still time consuming.

I'm guessing it was left on too long. Also, I used 3m adhesive remover to remove rubber marks. It never hazed the bra, and I thought it was fine, but I'm wondering if it may have weakened the bra? I tried xpel's cleaner, and it hazed the film badly.

I'd like to use it again (the paint underneath was in great shape), but don't want to go through the aggravation of removing it again, and possible damage to the paint with the plastic razor scraping the adhesive. What do you guys think?

Wouldn't try re-using. Get new one. Using heat gin when removing helps. 3m adhesive remover should work well. If you going to do body work and paint anyway then use a little enamel reducer on a rag should take it right off

Clear bra is tough to remove. I've been doing it on many cars and it is always the same mess - regardless of how long it's been on it. Sometimes you get lucky and there isn't much glue residue.

On my race car, it is holding up relatively well and I have no plans of removing it. If I ever had to replace any body panels or the front bumper, I'd definitely put clear bra on it.

This may or may not be an answer to what you're asking, but my suggestion? Hire a pro for removal. You know, the same guy you would use to apply the clear film in the first place. Obviously this wouldn't apply if you apply the clear film yourself. JMO. :)

I'm in the industry, use a steamer, it'll help out substantially with removal. You'll still have tiny bits and pieces left of adhesive, but it cuts down the work.

^^Oh yeah, excellent suggestion and I should've thought of that. :) I used a hand-held steamer (less than $30 at Walmart) to remove a Clearplex windshield film and it worked like a charm.

There is defintely an art to working with this stuff; to do it really well. I've applied tearoffs and smaller pieces, but I'd like to get more proficient with it just because I think its cool stuff.

I'll try a steamer and see how it works. Thanks for the suggestion.

The clear bra definitely did it's job. The paint underneath looks great. It's just a pain to get off when it gets old or "too" worn.

What are you guys using to remove rubber marks? 3m worked great, but I think it may have weakend it. Xpels cleaner removed the marks, but you have to follow immediatley after with water which I didn't (my fault) and it hazed the film.

Mothers R3. Works great.

^what he said

that's the best stuff.
Works best if you get at the mark within 24 hours.

This is somewhat off topic but last weekend at Barber with NASA I noticed a nice BMW M3 in the hotel parking lot on Fri nite with copious amounts of clear tape on the hood, fenders, rockers etc.

On Sun I noticed it on the back of a flatbed being carried off the track after an incident. The tape did not help. Just saying.

maybe he needed thicker tape....

You did say race car, right? New livery every year :burnout:
I think you want to protect what you can easily enough so why not some vinyl wrap? You can try DIY like I am. Im trying red F/R bumper vlance on blue car:atwhore: I got 100sqft for under $50 from fleabay to experiment with, it is an air release vinyl. Very steep learning curve with a few pieces going straight to garbage, I later learned i didnt need to trash it so soon.
2 people are virtually mandatory. I found it to be tedious and finicky but very forgiving. You can pull up pretty big pieces and fix/relay. Very stretchable and some overstretched looking places can be healed with heat. Butted joints are few but unavoidable for me, but they disappear pretty well. Most bubbles where it may be hard to lift can be pricked with a pin and lay down perfectly, some wrinkles can be removed without lifting as well. 1000X more forgiving than a window film.
It should also help protect the paint by putting any club decals or kitschy sponsor decals that might have harsh adhesive backs.


I've only had this stuff for 2 weeks so I'm late to the party and dont know longevity or creeping problems but damn this stuff is cool with nearly limitless color options, not to even mention the pro type printed stuff.