So true. :thumbsdown:

My current car has only been waxed by hand once.

My old E60 was a second handcar by BMW Nordic
and machine waxed a couple of times -> NO PAINT!

 

Before going that route, consider taking the car the a good detail shop. They may be able to improve the appearance.

 

There will also be a problem when you want to sell the car. The Vehicle History will so one color and the car will actually be another color. Carbon Black is a very hard paint to work with, mainly because it is two different color's. When the car is painted at the factory, it is done is a series of level's with computerized robotic machines that have lasers to tell if the paint is the same around the car. It is a risky gamble if you ask me; however you have to be happy.

 

Not necessarily true. If you find the right talented shop, you might be able to get an even better finish and shine. Course it might cost 10k-20k.

 

I agree!
Actually my father-in-law has a body-shop. He has shown me many times the standard paint job that comes on cars is most times 'cloudy'. Even on cars like Porsche and BMW. This actually makes his job a bit difficult, because his paint job is generally better than of factory!!
I can imagine you might be dissatisfied with the factory paint job, so a repaint can be a serious option as long as you keep the same colour and go to a decent body shop

 

If you ever plan to sell the car, I wold strongly recommend NOT painting it. You will loose value and possibly have a hard time selling the car. Like many others on this post, I walk away when ever I see paint work on a car. I don't care how good the body shop is, you can always tell when a car has been repainted (paint on seals, rough edges, overspray, etc....)

I would try a good hand wax or detail shop first.
If your in the SF Bay Area I would stay away from Sponges Detail of San Ramon. On a $400 detail job on my Porsche they went through the paint with the buffing wheel on the upper qtr panel. I had to get paint work to repair it. I searched everywhere for the best body shop, talked to the owner about how important it was to not be abel to tell if the car had paint work. Well, I got my car back and it looked great from a distance, but if I was buying the car, I would be able to tell it had paint work.

Good Luck and I agree that the BMW paint is not the best.

 

Ditto, I wouldn't buy a used car that has been repainted.

 

I think changing your paint will devalue your car...people buying the car might think you had a major acident thats why you have to repaint the whole car.....but if u really want to i would recomend a more unique colour!! maybe the Blue colour the "Alpina" uses? i saw a E39 repainted in that colour...really stands out!

 

It broke my heart to have to repaint the rear quarter on my car after someone scraped the car in a parking lot. But it had to be done.

The shop that did the work did a great job. I've bought enough slightly used cars that - at least to my experienced amatuer eye - I couldn't see the repaint. I used the same shop that BMW uses locally. It's interesting that - at least in Canada - BMW dealers don't have their own body shops. They tend to outsource the work to local, good body shops.

Regardless, I'm sure it'll cost me when the time comes.

Cheers

 

I had my car foe 2 years and the paint job is like new my is silver.
just polish it evey 2 weeks or so that will protect the paint