Prius Clear Coat Bubbling and Peeling - 2008 Light Green

Since you live in Arizona it’s very sunny there. Is it parked in the shade? How often have you waxed it?

 

welcome

my daughter has a 2008 light green
not sure what you can accomplish with toyota, it is 10 years old

all the best!

 

After 10 years, this type of damage can only be avoided if you regularly wash, polish and wax and stay parked in shade as often as possible...

 

I have a 2006 that is the same color. Mine has clear coat damage on the roof and spoiler. Mine doesn't look nearly as bad as yours though. I would guess it has to do with where you park it and how you maintained the exterior.

 

Usually the lighter colors like Silver Pine Mica don't get it so bad. Barcelona Red gets it something fierce. Lots of Toyotas and Nissans get it real bad around here. Maybe the clear coats the Japanese used in this era just weren't UV resistant enough.

Not much you can do about it now, short of a full repaint. Sorry.

 

Poorly maintained paint.

 

You'll see lots of paint problems on the roof, spoiler, and hood. Other parts will hold up much better.

You can paint the damage parts or get a vinyl wrap, which is often cheaper

 

Our 2008's spoiler is looking pretty bad. The fading started about two years ago but it has really accelerated this year. On a 10 year old car I'm not looking to pay through the nose for a professional job to fix it. Just something that looks halfway decent and I can get a few years out of. The plan is to repaint it while the car is down in December for the next Prolong battery maintenance. I've been looking at some online videos and it doesn't look too difficult as long as I'm careful and have some patience. Paint + clear coat sprays should cost less than $20 at the local auto parts store.

By 9 years old the blue paint job on the first Prius we owned was completely shot in all three of the areas you named....the roof, spoiler and hood.

 

You can get 1 stage paint mixed into spray cans at good paint shops. I did that for my daughters Nissan Pathfinder. Had a special 2 year only paint color. They had no problem mixing up the color. They put the pigment into a spray can and mix it up.

 

I have a gold 2008 Prius and it is having the same issue. I have maintained it with regular washing and waxing which hasn’t made a difference. The spoiler was the first to show paint fading. The paint on the roof is crazing and the hood is showing small areas where the paint is starting to come off but no crazing. I live in south Florida and the car has always been parked outside. My headlights are also fading. I had them buffed out for what was supposed to be a lifetime warranty and they continue to fade and need rebuffing on a regular basis.

 

I have an O6 in pine mica. The spoiler is in bad shape. You will get no accommodation from Toyota on a 10 year old car.

 

no, her paint is fine. and it has never been washed or waxed, except rain, snow and ice.

 

My '08 is in silver pine mica and I have absolutely no paint issues. According to the CarFax, the car has spent it's whole life in AZ and NV. I'm not sure how my car has escaped these issues.

 

I had one green one yep same thing. The roof is a good candidate for a spray experiment. They sell mix to factory code matched paint online with clear coat already mixed in a can. Plastic sheets and masking tape at dollar tree, probably sandpaper too. If it doesnt turn out, its just the roof. If it does turn out you can do the rest piece by piece for a couple hundred so long as its the same color you shouldn't need to buy a ton of paint.

 

My wife's pine mica '07 isn't too bad. Not as bad as yours by a long shot. Even my barcelona red '05 didn't get that bad and that color was notorious for blistering. Only bad parts on my wife's car, other than some chips on the plastic parts) are the door handles and spoiler. The handles we all crinkled. I stuck plastic chrome covers on them. The spoiler was badly faded. I sanded it down and painted it with primer, gloss black, and clear. It came out pretty nice except for some lint that landed in it while the pain was wet. Grrrr!

 

Since only the top of the spoiler was oxidizing I decided, after looking at some videos of how to do it, paint the top of my spoiler without taking it off the car. One day in my garage, light wet sanding, a spray can of Duplicolor in Barcelona Red plus a spray can of Duplicolor Clear Coat and masking of the back of the car to protect it from overspray. Total cost to do it turned out to be less than $25 for the paint and sandpaper at Pep Boys with enough left over to do it one or two more times.

I've already gotten some complements on the improvement from family and friends. The new paint matches the rest of the car well and doesn't look "off" like most section paint jobs do. Being careful to spray very lightly and evenly while applying multiple coats there's not even a visible seam between the newly painted area and the original paint job. For sure, it's not professional body shop "baked on" quality but after all the car is 11 years old. I'm not looking for showroom brilliance, just functionality and a decent appearance. With a cost of only $10 worth of supplies actually used for the job I don't even mind if I have to do it again in a couple of years.

 

Pics?

Always good to see everyone’s handiwork.