[lost1750GTV]

I did state the facts of what you posted, what you felt to be worth mentioning after taking delivery.

 

[lockem]

I did state the facts of what you posted, what you felt to be worth mentioning after taking delivery.

No, you said I was annoyed with a lot of things when I only stated that I was annoyed with the visor design flaw.

 

[lost1750GTV]

please please, any one who cares, refer to lockem's actual post rather than my brief and wholly inaccurate summary.
I do apologize for taking such extensive liberties with his impressions after only having it on the road long enough to get to the detailer.

I also apologize in advance if, as defined by the state of California, the route taken involved an expressway, freeway, street, or any other form of "driving path" which might not be a road, by definitions all should be aware of and utilize correctly, regardless of location or context.

 

[Il_Conte]

Congrats! Enjoy the car and carve them canyons. Additional work can wait...

 

[Woodstk88]

Chip, he's already annoyed by a design flaw, panel fit, and paint matching, maybe has an issue with the seats and transmission, and is unhappy with the dealer prep.

I am just stating facts. Maybe you should stick to that too?

The only things I am seriously annoyed by at this point are the late delivery and Niello Alfa's refusal to participate in the FCA affiliates program.

Just got told today by my dealer that the would not participate in the program. Not really happy about that but I just can't get myself to walk away from the car I ordered and have been waiting for.

 

[lockem]

Congrats! Enjoy the car and carve them canyons. Additional work can wait...

Thanks. For PPF to be fully effective it cannot wait. Ju st about everything else can be put off and should at least be put off until I get a chance to break in the car.

The dealer indicated that the Pirelli All season tires take 500 miles to break in.

Just got told today by my dealer that the would not participate in the program. Not really happy about that but I just can't get myself to walk away from the car I ordered and have been waiting for.

Same here. However if I had done my homework up front I would have ordered through a different dealer. There are at least 6 dealers within a reasonable driving distance of the S.F. Bay Area. I chose this dealer because they were the only dealer that had a car with close to the right equipment available for a test drive. At the time they had about as many Giulias in stock as all of the other dealers combined. Now they have a bunch of Stelvios, which apparently are not selling as quickly as Giulia.

 

[chaadster]

@lockem I’m looking forward to pics! Sounds like you’ve planned some neat mods!

 

[Woodstk88]

Thanks. For PPF to be fully effective it cannot wait. Ju st about everything else can be put off and should at least be put off until I get a chance to break in the car.

The dealer indicated that the Pirelli All season tires take 500 miles to break in.



Same here. However if I had done my homework up front I would have ordered through a different dealer. There are at least 6 dealers within a reasonable driving distance of the S.F. Bay Area. I chose this dealer because they were the only dealer that had a car with close to the right equipment available for a test drive. At the time they had about as many Giulias in stock as all of the other dealers combined. Now they have a bunch of Stelvios, which apparently are not selling as quickly as Giulia.

The dealer I did my test drive and would have ordered from told me that they wouldn't have order allocation until August (2018) I didn't want to wait that long just to order a MY2019 model.

 

[Chipshot]

How's the snow pack at altitude? If not still low, would be fun to see a picture of your new Giulia dwarfed by the white stuff.

 

[lockem]

How's the snow pack at altitude? If not still low, would be fun to see a picture of your new Giulia dwarfed by the white stuff.

The weather here is currently late spring-like, conditions are extremely bad water-wise (as-in no snow). The mountain summits have 12" of snow when they should have 12' (they are officially at 14% of the water content of normal). My place at 7500' elevation has less than 1" of snow pack compared to last year at this time with 4'. The only upside I see is that I can put off buying snow tires until next year. No significant precipitation is expected for the next 2 weeks. Southern California is back to extreme drought conditions. Northern California would be too, except for that one storm in early January that caused a lot of mud slides managed to put precipitation for January above normal even though almost all of it fell inside a 48 hour window. It doesn't make up for December having 1% of normal precipitation.

Part of the problem with the snow pack is that it rained at high altitudes in January.

Heavy precipitation has been known to happen in March and April, but it is relatively rare.

I think there is very little chance of getting any great car and snow pictures and not much chance of hooning in a parking lot this year. No chance to try out my UTV tracks either <sigh>. Maybe you could send some of your snow our way?

 

[lockem]

Some pictures from the beauty salon (Imperial Works in Sacramento), courtesy of the shop.
https://www.imperialworkssacramento.com
Reasonable wait times, unlike Silicon Valley shops offering similar services.

Mopar CF grill installed in wrapped front fascia.

Rear door wrap (Xpel) almost done.

Numerous other work-in-progress shots were also provided. No tinting, since the windows already have a reasonable factory tint (part of infrared windshield?).

 

[lockem]

Here is another progress picture from Imperial Works.

Note the color and position mismatch between the rear fascia and body panel (the wrap is installed on both in the picture). In person in sunlight the color difference is less obvious.

This might be a useful reference photo for anyone having damage repaired. If the factory cannot get the color to match perfectly, I don't think it is reasonable to expect a repair shop to do so.

I suspect the color match is better with the "solid" colors. Tricoat paints have directionality to the color.

Part of the positional issue appears to be adjustable, while part of it appears to be a mismatch in the design.

 

[Eagle7]

Lookin good. The color difference in that last pic might be due to the difference in the material the paint is on. The aluminum is going to provide a brighter surface underneath the paint versus the polyurethane (or whatever they're using nowadays) bumper. My car is dark blue so I don't see any difference. Yours being white is obviously more susceptible to even the slightest variance. It's still looking good though. Over time the ppf on my car has smoothed out so that it looks like glass now. I got the entire front and doors covered. Now I'm thinking I should have had the whole car done, it looks that good.

 

[lockem]

Lookin good. The color difference in that last pic might be due to the difference in the material the paint is on. The aluminum is going to provide a brighter surface underneath the paint versus the polyurethane (or whatever they're using nowadays) bumper. My car is dark blue so I don't see any difference. Yours being white is obviously more susceptible to even the slightest variance. It's still looking good though. Over time the ppf on my car has smoothed out so that it looks like glass now. I got the entire front and doors covered. Now I'm thinking I should have had the whole car done, it looks that good.

The downside to having the whole car done as I am is that it costs nearly as much as repainting the whole car and it has a finite life expectancy. I suspect that a wrapped car should either be garaged or kept under a cover in order to maximize the life of the wrap. One plus of the full wrap is the risk of marks from a cover should be greatly reduced.

It might also be possible that the color difference is due to differences in the application of the flake layer, which is sensitive to density and angle, not just technical color. I believe that the base (silver?) layer is supposed to eliminate any visibility of what is underneath.

Yet another possibility is that the aluminum might be smoother than the plastic, causing a difference in the reflectivity of the base layer. Perhaps that is what you meant?

Anyway, thanks and yes the car looks good and the Xpel + ceramic coating should give the car an amazing sheen with durability and ease of maintenance. The GT350 that they had just finished in the shop when I dropped off Giulia sure looked amazing.

 

[Eagle7]

Oh believe me, the cost of repainting the entire car would be astronomical. Because of regulations, the cost of paint jobs has gone sky high. The paints themselves cost so much more than they used to because they now have to comply with environmental regulations. So does the actual process of painting the car. All kinds of environmental regulations have to be met with the paint booth and painting process. It's gotten ridiculous. With prep and paint, I wouldn't be at all surprised if a full repaint would be in the 5 figures.

This is my first car with the ppf on it, so we'll see how it works out, but so far so good.

 

[Bella Berlina]

Bumper covers that look ever so slightly darker than the rest of the body are pretty common on cars painted in light colors. I do not know if this is always the case, but sometimes it is caused by the flex agent added to the paint used on the bumper covers.

 

[lockem]

Thanks. I wan't aware that there is any additives in fascia paint, but that makes sense. I was quoted ~$5000 to repaint my Mazda Protege in a solid color and was guessing $7000-8000 for Giulia in tri-coat from that. Maybe pure BS since I simply made up the later number.

 

[lockem]

Here is the latest picture of Giulia at the beauty shop, now with Xpel fully installed and some subtle extras added. It is worth noting how sunlight mutes the fascia color difference.

 

[chaadster]

Here is the latest picture of Giulia at the beauty shop, now with Xpel fully installed and some subtle extras added. It is worth noting how sunlight mutes the fascia color difference.

Had you considered a full wrap of the rocker panel? I was thinking about doing them in a carbon fiber look wrap, but my local shop didn't have any samples of the latest and greatest CF vinyl, the Elemento 6 from Sott.

I'm not sure I'm commited to the look, though; I'm no Photoshop wiz, so I haven't visualized it, but it could look cool. I'd want to tie it in with doing the mirrors and maybe the B-pillar...dunno.

 

[lockem]

Had you considered a full wrap of the rocker panel? I was thinking about doing them in a carbon fiber look wrap, but my local shop didn't have any samples of the latest and greatest CF vinyl, the Elemento 6 from Sott.

I'm not sure I'm commited to the look, though; I'm no Photoshop wiz, so I haven't visualized it, but it could look cool. I'd want to tie it in with doing the mirrors and maybe the B-pillar...dunno.

The rockers are fully wrapped in clear. I thought about doing the whole thing in black as that might be simpler to implement but concluded that it would make the car look like it has more ground clearance rather than giving the sense of motion one gets from the wing cross section shape that AR used on the QV.

My Crosstrek has fully covered rockers in patterned plastic that looks reasonably good, but in it's case the plastic is a thick bash plate and making the car look higher off the ground is appropriate. Also the Crosstrek rockers are flat while Giulia's rockers have a dramatic outward bulge.

Be careful of mixing CF patterns. It is easy to end up with a "hodge-podge" design.

I have the Mopar CF mirror caps, but Imperial had trouble installing them so they aren't in the picture. I'll post more on this as it develops.