Mod Journal - Charles the Prius

I acquired a 2008 Grey Touring Prius with 82k miles in November after getting really tired of Subaru repairs and $400 gas bills. I delivery drive for Papa Johns, college is almost 50 miles one way, and I do A LOT of traveling. As much as I can. At this point I get an oil change from Lithia Toyota every month (they're free!). That tells you my driving.

Anyways, until I'm out of school and can find a job to afford my dream toys – here's me having some fun and experimenting with my Prii!

First order: after getting backed into by a drunk with no insurance, GEICO promptly repaired my vehicle. Which means a new headlight. This is nice, except now my old one looks very obviously old.

So after sanding down with 400,600,1000, and 2000 grit sandpaper, it was time to mask and bag off my surrounding area and go to work with rustoleum gloss clear with UV coating.

Let dry for 12 hours, then used 3M scratch polishing compound (best stuff I've found yet). And voila


Right, now it's time to pop out my dent as best as I can.

This sucker was here when I bought my ride. Helped me negotiate the prii from 12k to 9.5k BUT it's ugly and if Uber or Lyft do indeed service my county it's not acceptable. I'm not looking for perfect, just less noticeable. Removed some of the interior to access inside the painted panel, pounded out the dent with a rubber mallet and voila


It's still there, but I don't want to pay $1k for a full repair given my driving habits and my tendencies know it might happen again. But it is less noticeable and that's perfect for me.

Next I practiced my plasti dip painting skills, gloss black on the badges. Will paint the rest later.



Lastly I was so impressed with the 3m polisher I tested it on a deep clear coat shopping cart scratch, it was gone completely! No pictures for that, but this encourages me to buy some new pads for my polisher and go to town on my whole car

 

Huh they show here, I'll check later!


iPhone ?

 

Yeah I see that on the website, I think it's too late for me to edit postings (whyyyyy) so I'll post the pictures down this line


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Here is the car after the accident. Notice the busted reflector. Light was pretty busted up, replaced after the body shop did their repairs.



Here's the car with the headlight sanded down and ready for a few coats of gloss clear from Rustoleum. This can contains some UV protectant.



and after the clear coats and polishing



The dent on the side of the vehicle:


and after (not perfect but makes me a bit happier)



I should've applied pressure on the outside and tried popping it out that way, but oh well.

and lastly here's my first attempt and plasti dipping:



lic. plate is scribbled out from snapchat haha

 

I spoiled myself purchasing it. My last two cars were basic as hell and I wanted something more comfortable. Plus if I had to purchase a Prius I had to look for the coolest one!

 

Fun fact: the dealership I purchased this from never registered the plate to my vehicle. I could run a red light camera and never get caught. I'm grabbing some new Pacific wonderland plates like this here soon. (Found this out when dealing with police about the drunk driver).

 

So for October:

I plan on tinting all windows except the windshield with a film that blocks up to 80% of heat, Xpel Prime XR. I don't sunburn easily At All but this year, with an hour trip to school one way and my job as a delivery driver. Plus my love of the outdoors and road tripping I got some light sunburns on my arms from driving. I'm also tired of how hot that thing can get! I figured it was time to drop some $$ and get this car tinted. I'm planning on 35% all the way around, it's the lowest legal limit. Our police aren't very picky about vehicle mods but with the amount of travelling I do, I don't want to stumble on an officer grumpy.

There's also a clear heat blocking film I might put on the windshield to further reduce the heat of my car. The lady at the tint shop offers a great warranty (lifetime ownership of car) that protects me from my own error. If I load up something and it scratches the film it's replaced for free, great deal! She also informed me that in the fall and winter months they run deals due to low demand. I expect the tint to be completed late October.

I also plan on purchasing some HID headlights off somebody and retro fitting some Morimoto D2S projectors in them (From TRS). I'll paint them as well - but I want to be careful on the look because I don't want it to be tacky. I'm thinking a mostly black housing but with some chrome elements. I've been studying other vehicle headlights on the road and seeing what they do. I'm going to avoid angel eyes and other tacky LED lighting. I feel that LED lighting is used to accent and pronounce the design and shape of the headlights and to be quite frank I think the Gen 2 headlight shape is ugly. This should be a fun project!

I do have one question, to those who've done the retro fit do you still get to keep the auto headlight leveler? I don't want to remove the aiming functionality of the headlights.

Lastly I'll dish out a few bucks and purchase a light tail light tint!

 

Wrapped my mirror covers gloss black!

I make vinyl stickers as a portfolio project and for some side money. I found some black vinyl that's not good for stickers so I decided to wrap my housings black!


Before, almost all cleaned up!


During, phones live photo messed up the sharpness


After! It was raining hard

I plan on redoing them with maybe some chrome black vinyl and a better cleaning job.

I also bought some black locking lug nuts and am thinking about wrapping the center cap on my wheels.

Can't wait for next month

 

Super stoked! Went to the junkyard to grab some new parts, purchased used mirror caps, a new jack (coworker busted the old one), and an antenna off an Acura RDX. I hate long antennas, don't mind short ones. Was thinking about doing a shark fin but I want to wrap my roof sometime and that adhesive would complicate it.

Also de baged the Prius!






I also grabbed a new license plate that I've been meaning to slap on since my accident in July!

For the sides, I was thinking if it's possible to pull the hybrid off and the holes are placed right maybe replacing the hybrid with "Toyota" like what's on the hatch. Then dipping it gloss black?

I've also got a headlight retro fit in the works, taillight tint, a rear sway bar, rain guards, a window tint, and a hopeful blinker mirror cap on the cheap!

 

Love the Pacific Wonderland plate also took off the Lithia plate border and painted the screws gloss black!

 

Picking up a Toyota Matrix rear sway bar, some genuine Toyota rain guards, and taillight tint today!

Gave up on my Scion TC -> Prius mirror modification, it might be done as they're very similar but not without some hacking. Will list my mirror parts on eBay and actually make some profit haha.

BUT I did end up ordering these from Japan: Unpainted Replacement Side Mirror Cover w/LED Blinker for Toyota Prius 03-09

Once I receive them I'll paint them 202 gloss black and fit them. Stoked for the looks and added safety.

I also baked my new halogen headlights for a D2S retrofit and paintjob. I'll use my OEM ballast and additional parts and probably list the old housings for sale on eBay to make some money back. (unless someone on PC wants them).

Was really hoping to get a tint done in November but I think I'll hold off until the new year!

 

Well Sigma and another Prius import site sells them for close to $500. When I said on the cheap I bought Scion TC mirrors and planned on modifying my covers and fitting those blinkers. That would've cost $80, and then re selling the covers for around $30 a piece which meant my mirrors would've run me $20.

But then I got to inspecting and aligning the fitment and it can be done but I'm not too comfortable with my dremel skills.

I will end up selling my mirror covers for both the Prius (bought an extra set at the junk yard) and scion with the scion blinkers for profit. Figure it'll cut the edge off that $100 price tag.

Bought them unpainted too which saved me $50


As for the retrofit, I'm doing an easy Morimoto D2S retrofit. Not doing any LED's in that fake led border. I feel led's accent the shape of the headlight and our Gen II's have ugly headlights.

I've done a ton of browsing on this site and have looked at what other users have done. As well as browsing TRS's instagram. What I'm doing is a mainly gloss black headlight with some chrome tidbits. I'm removing the corner light amber, and I've cut down the reflector and made it much smaller. So I still have a reflector but it's not super big and ugly.

I thought about removing it entirely, but with my build I have to keep in mind the amount of traveling I do over Cali, Oregon, and Washington and I don't want to run the risk of a fix it ticket!

I'm painting my headlights today while I change my trans oil, will post it up if I get the time!

I also redid my badges with plastidip, looks much much better. I'm getting better with a rattle can, also installed my visors which the install made sense after staring at the pictures but the Japanese instructions and newspaper packing were quite interesting.

 

So today I changed my trans oil, dipped my grill and lower bumper and finished painting 1/2 headlights! I'm a little reluctant to show the headlights as TRS has yet to ship the stupid package but they're mostly gloss black, some chrome elements on top (for light output) and the shroud will remain chrome. I'm grabbing the Orbit shrouds!






I'll repost the headlights once the shrouds come in to feel more proud of myself haha

I'm grabbing the orbit shroud, here's a pic to help build an image of the final product: