Several years ago I started buying pre-cut window tint kits from Northern Tint. The first cheap 1 ply kit I purchased faded in about 1 year and the 2nd slightly more expensive 2 ply tint has faded slightly but still retains a fair amount of color well into the 2nd year of sun exposure.
I found a seller on ebay named "nanofilm" selling Ceramic 1.5 mil 2 ply tint for a reasonable price and decided to give them a shot since all the other sellers of ceramic film were selling for much more money.
I purchased a 20" X 60 Ft roll of 35% VLT for roughly $75 with free shipping and was surprised that the seller upgraded my shipping to expedited arriving from South Korea to middle america in just over 1 week. They have already raised the price of the same product by $10 in about 1 month.
After installing the ceramic film on my daughter's free impreza my first impression is very positive. There is no optical distortion when viewing the tint from within the car and the 35% is still light enough to see at night without any impairment. The tint doesn't seem to easily slide around even though I was using a fairly soapy mix in my sprayer. Although the 1.5 mil film is thin enough to crease fairly easily, the scratch resistant layer holds up well to the hard plastic squeegee that came with my roll of tint. The small bubbles that would not squeegee away due to insufficient heat shaping will sometimes stick and not be visible after the water dries up. My inexperienced cutting and shaping skills don't look too bad from 10 feet away. I just keep in mind that I'm saving over $200 whenever I look at any imperfections in the tint job. Good thing I'm not one of those types of detail oriented crazies that will be upset over a bubble or a non-straight cut edge.
I estimated that I would have enough to redo all of my cars when the time comes.
Luckily, the Northern tint was easy to remove from the first car. Following a video on youtube, I used a heat gun and warmed up the glass from the outside to the point of being uncomfortable to touch with the back of my hand. Using a razor blade, I found an edge to loosen from the glass and simply peeled it away with a slow steady motion leaving virtually no residue on the glass. Yay, score 1 for cheap tint.
Cutting your own tint is so easy, why would anyone pay more to have it pre-cut? one mistake and you have to re-order.
Although I'm confident that my work falls under the title "Bad tint jobs", I'm happy to say I did it myself.
I plan to update this page to report on the tint as it ages and how it rejects the heat during the summer.
I found a seller on ebay named "nanofilm" selling Ceramic 1.5 mil 2 ply tint for a reasonable price and decided to give them a shot since all the other sellers of ceramic film were selling for much more money.
I purchased a 20" X 60 Ft roll of 35% VLT for roughly $75 with free shipping and was surprised that the seller upgraded my shipping to expedited arriving from South Korea to middle america in just over 1 week. They have already raised the price of the same product by $10 in about 1 month.
After installing the ceramic film on my daughter's free impreza my first impression is very positive. There is no optical distortion when viewing the tint from within the car and the 35% is still light enough to see at night without any impairment. The tint doesn't seem to easily slide around even though I was using a fairly soapy mix in my sprayer. Although the 1.5 mil film is thin enough to crease fairly easily, the scratch resistant layer holds up well to the hard plastic squeegee that came with my roll of tint. The small bubbles that would not squeegee away due to insufficient heat shaping will sometimes stick and not be visible after the water dries up. My inexperienced cutting and shaping skills don't look too bad from 10 feet away. I just keep in mind that I'm saving over $200 whenever I look at any imperfections in the tint job. Good thing I'm not one of those types of detail oriented crazies that will be upset over a bubble or a non-straight cut edge.
I estimated that I would have enough to redo all of my cars when the time comes.
Luckily, the Northern tint was easy to remove from the first car. Following a video on youtube, I used a heat gun and warmed up the glass from the outside to the point of being uncomfortable to touch with the back of my hand. Using a razor blade, I found an edge to loosen from the glass and simply peeled it away with a slow steady motion leaving virtually no residue on the glass. Yay, score 1 for cheap tint.
Cutting your own tint is so easy, why would anyone pay more to have it pre-cut? one mistake and you have to re-order.
Although I'm confident that my work falls under the title "Bad tint jobs", I'm happy to say I did it myself.
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| Bad idea that required a rework. Too much light was coming through those corners. |
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| Brake light area removed and re-cut. |
well heat rejection doesn't seem terrific but there has been no noticeable fading after the first brutal summer. I'm still happy with this film.
ReplyDeleteJuly 2019 - the tint has faded enough around the window edges where I can see a darker band when I roll the windows down. Despite this, the tint retains a fair amount of color but I doubt the film is actually ceramic. I have a professionally applied tint in my Miata and there is zero fade by the window edges. This cheap tint was not worth the money due to fading but it was still higher quality than the Northern Tint that I initially practiced with.
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