All I know is that my front bumper and hood looked worse after 1 year than my Jetta did after 6 years. And when I made my insurance claim (car was ~1 year old), the guy basically marked the entire car as being one giant paint chip.
Yes. I had a 2011 Nissan Sentra that had 55K miles when I got rid of it, I could count the paint chips that it had on one hand (and I NEVER waxed that car once, not that I actually believe wax does anything to prevent road chips). My five month old WRX (that i wax every three weeks)... it would take me all day to count the tiny little chips all over the front. I don't even want to know what its gonna look like in a year.
I mean, a mere grain of sand leaves a mark, no joke.
Have to agree. I backed into my father's Buick Lucerne the other day. Very minor collision, maybe 1 mph (I was almost stopped). It was a brush from my rear driver's side quarter panel with his same side. It left some dirt and a small scratch less than 1" long on his car. We removed it with a magic eraser, and the Lucerne looks 100% undamaged. My 2013 Impreza SWP has two spots of completely removed paint.
Now I know this is anecdotal and the angles may have disadvantaged the Subaru, but damn, the two cars barely touched and the Buick was unscathed whereas the Subaru took a relative beating. My 2011 WRX was the same - a lot of front end dings to be touched up when I traded it.
Yes it is bad, but at the moment there is no car like subaru. Compare price vise and performance nothing can match it. Take look at Fiat or Alfaromeo if you drive them in snow, better do not wash your car as fenders could fall-off.
Car is still unbeatable. First match IMO is BMW 5-- xi and at 150%+ price. Not worth it.
It does make you wonder though does Subaru just skimp on paint and interior quality to save costs or just they know the buyers of their cars will buy em anyway. I mean if all of a sudden Subaru paint was awesome and the interior was awesome would alot more people buy Subarus? I doubt it. People buy Subarus because of AWD and in terms of the WRX/STi the rally heritage and fun of driving it.
So basically if you want a nice interior and your paint to hold up...if you care about that stuff.....add another $5k in what you're gonna have to do to the the car right after you buy a new one getting paint protection and film and then upgrading the stereo (if it matters to you) and misc interior pieces upgrades.
I personally think the interior in the STi is great. Sure it has some hard plastic in places. Be nice to see that being replaceable in the aftermarket. Those shiny metal hard plastic pieces. But I'm coming from a Nissan Xterra which is rugged and the interior is far from luxurious. Now if I was coming from a BMW I might think otherwise.
Clear bra. Get it on the entire car if you can (if I had the money, I would). I drove a beater 14 year-old Volvo (don't laugh) before my WRX. I swear there were no rock chips anywhere on that POS. My WRX I've had for exactly 1 year now has 6 or 7 rock chips now... I'm starting to lose count. That number would be much higher if it weren't for the clear bra covering the front of my car. Think of clear bra as a condom. Condoms protect against STi's...ermmm I mean rock chips. Derp.
Not from my perspective lol. We have a '98 Outback that came with a hell of a good paint job. They know how to do it and always have.
Paint is nasty stuff. I believe their stance is that really laying it on is environmentally less thoughtful. Same as how some shoe companies are doing wonky stuff to not use glues.
This, is a 2003 car, picture from this day. It has actually rusted through in two little pots in the rear. The bumpers are fairly trashed which is normal, but have faded some. Chips & swirls? There are some few chips but you have to get close on them to even notice. I'd not consider this abnormal at all. It is just washed, needs a claybar, and no wax.
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