Painting/plastidip limited grill surround

Just did my back bumper caps and I'm not sure how I feel about it:



The finish looks good, better than I was expecting, but the color is a shade lighter than factory. Like Boosted said, it will be good enough for bumpers, but not so much for the grille surround. I still plan on testing it on the bulge, to see how it looks directly next to the factory paint. The paint matched Sport grille is moving higher on the list.

 

Yep, just go paint matched on the grille!
Bumpers are overlooked easily, grille - not so much

Did you use glosifier? Doesn’t look like it.
Way better than chrome!

 

Like others said, just buy the surround.
I wrapped my hood bulge, mirror caps, front door handles and all four of my end caps.
The Oracal vinyl is the closest product/paint I've found to the 1G3.

 

I did, but it was a quick application of it and the first time I tried it. It's actually got a decent sheen to it, but not sure the pic was the best to pick up either the color or the sheen.

 

Ohhhh that looks good!!!!!

 

Pics and videos are super hard to reproduce as they are in person.
Cool

 

Thanks brotha!
Likewise...I would have never known yours were dipped.

 

Apparently it could be I lack the plasti technique... some of those actually do look really good.

 

Did you do this yourself or a shop? Looks legit!! What did it cost you and do you think the vinyl is strong enough to resist rock chips?

 

That came out pretty good!
I would not get your hopes up regarding the Toyota matched parts. You'll get durability and proper paint job, but as far as color matching, they often miss the mark. Look at 99% of the 'color matched' grilles on this site (including mine), none of them match perfectly, dealer lots too. Metal next to plastic, and different batches of paint. If you get it close its a win, but dont expect it to be perfect.

 

One of my professional responsibilities (R&D Mechanical Engineer) is to specify paint/powder coated color and texture specifications for our fabrication suppliers. This also includes injection molding polymers and mold texture specifications. We have global manufacturing sources for painted/powder coated sheet metal enclosures as well as injection molded plastic enclosure panels. These parts are for high-end laboratory chemical analysis instrumentation.

Color/texture matching is a continuing and never ending problem. We have a specialized division within the corporation that has as it's only task to qualify go/no-go sample panels for the purposes of acceptance/rejection criteria by all of our manufacturing divisions and their quality control groups (both color and texture).

No two parts from various suppliers and their individual processes will ever match precisely but minor variations have to be acceptable for manufacturing to be able to build our instruments.

Based on this position, I have to say that the parts I got from Toyota (and Sparks custom paint shop) have no discernable difference in color or any other cosmetic attribute from the originally installed parts on my Tundra. These parts (hood bulge, grill and surround, bumper end caps) were purchased seven months after I took delivery of my 2018 Tundra. Way better than we can expect for our instrument parts.

Dan

 

I plastic dipped mine. I’m on the fence about it. First time using the stuff.

 

Thanks brotha! Yes...I did it myself. I've always been a DIY'er, at least to give it a good attempt. I had a lot of training from YouTube! I started small with the mirror caps, then the hood bulge, which I guess gave me the confidence to do the bumper caps.

I got a 60" X 84" roll originally, which was enough to do everything I listed. I got it from ColorWrapture and paid $83. I don't think they are in business anymore. Check with Fellers or Metro-restyling. I know they sell it as well.
I used, ORAFOL 970RA-937 (Gloss Charcoal Metallic)

I've had the bulge and mirror caps done for over a year. I completed the end caps in Feb. I'm outside of Atlanta and run the interstates weekly and off-road/hunting on the weekends. (Knocking wood) I've not had a rock chip or tear in the vinyl yet.

Here's my original post after I completed the caps.
https://www.tundras.com/threads/color-matched-bumper-end-cap-thread.10762/page-5#post-526702

 

I finished the front end on mine today:

Before


After


I like the look better than the chrome, but it bugs me that there's a substantial color and finish difference, but it'll work for the meantime until I get the color matched grille assembly.

Close-up

 

@TRDFerguson, link to the paint/plastidip you did the caps and surround in?
Looks sick!

 

Do you have any more pictures of you grill/truck from different angles? I just received a new pro grill and am debating on putting it straight on or swapping the insert with my current limited one. Thanks!

 

I’m considering doing insert swap just so I don’t have to mess with the TSS. There is one seller on eBay that has the complete surround/bulge setup in Inferno but they was $550 plus $140 to ship. I’d rather do 6112’s for that kind of money.

 

I ended up just installing the Pro grill so I didn't have to mess with swapping inserts or potentially breaking tabs. Looks good, no regrets.

 

I wish I could find a matte black surround and bulge. I would just use my current grille. I think it might look pretty good.

 

I'm working on that now. Using a 2014 chrome surround that I will be bed lining it and using my 2019 grille insert.

My thread will be of no help to you (no help for me yet either ), but I'll update it with any progress or mistakes I make.

https://www.tundras.com/threads/2014-grill-to-2019-project-piece.73824/

 

I will definitely keep an eye on your thread for some more ideas on which way I should go!