I've had my TSX for about 13 months and there has been a number of paint chips in the front. I've never been on gravel or anything either, just normal driving. It is especially bad on the hood directly above the headlights, so much so that it's gone down to bare metal in the chips and they've rusted.
I recently sanded the rust spots and touched them up with paint so it looks good now, but I was still annoyed that after just a year this was a problem.
Is Acura known to have crappy paint like this or what?
I was looking at another Acura in the parking lot (3.2TL), and it had the same thing

My BMW is a '97 and has far less chips, so I was expecting that an Acura would have the same quality!

 

The paint is thin and the thread is repost.

 

Acura paint sucks.

Acura on the TSX/TL/CL uses a 2-coat, 1-bake paint process.

BMW on the other hand uses a 7-coat paint process.

Mercedes uses an 8-coat, 8-bake process.


The RL and MDX get a decent paint process... 5-coat,4-bake on the MDX, 4-coat 4-bake on the RL.

 

Well, this is good info.

Do you know if the optional 800$CAD paint on BMW or Mercedes has a different process? Unless this is what is described above.

Base paint on these cars are typically only black, white and red.

I agree that Honda/Acura paint is generally very weak.

 

Man why did Acura go so cheap w/ the paint on those models???

 

who knows im a lil upset about it as well...i am just waiting to pain my car anyway...gonna go with the same color just more coats and gonna add some micro flake to it along with 3-4 coats of clear to give it that always wet look

 

honda paint has always been known to be weak...thats why i got a clear bra a few weeks after i got my tsx

 

i was sanding to prepare for touch up this weekend, and i really really suprise the clear coat, very very thin.....and soft... :angry:

 

Yup. I have the same thoughts as gogozy.
I knew Honda has brutal paint since I used to own an Integra.
So, I was prepare to accept some chips.
But, I when I inspected the cross section of a chip on my hood I was really surprised by how thin the paint is. What gives? -This is supposed to be a higher end car.

 

I agree 100%, this paint is not up to standard w/ how high end this car should be

 

I had a lot of paint problems with my old Integra. It sucks to know my TSX is going to be a repeat. Anyone know what it would cost to get a couple of coats of clear-coat on it?

 

I've been using the hood portion of the OEM bra and considering my commute is about 60/40 highway, so far so good....only a couple of small chips so far.

 

I'm not a fan of the bra look. What is the clear bra made out of? Anyone have any pics?

 

Neither am I but I also am not a fan of the damaged hood look either which is what happened to my previous Honda. Yes, this isn't unique to the TSX !
The clear bra is basically a clear thick tape made of a thin flexible plastic Once your hood is chipped though it'll form air pockets/bubbles underneath.

 

I've had the material on the leading edges of my hood and fenders and the mirrors since the car was new.

Mine is the 3M material from Invinca-shield http://www.invinca-shield.com/main.htm which asks $98 for the basic kit. I added the mirror pieces. The shop that installed it for me me charged me 2 hours ... and it definitely took them longer than that.

A lot of the companies that cut the 3M stoneshields deeply discount it. Check around.

After a few years, the hood on my Volvo looked like Tony Soprano had used it as the backdrop for a shotgun assassination. That's why I bought the stoneshield. My wife's '01 Honda has non-metallic paint and isn't as bad as the '98 Volvo by a long shot.

There have been countless threads on the BMW E46 board about the same problem. eg. http://bimmer.roadfly.org/bmw/forums/e46/458212-1.html

This is a problem NOT limited to Acuras!

The "Clear Bra" is not any more noticeable than the stoneshields on a Porsche. Which are made from exactly the same stuff.

 

This car isn't nearly as "high-end" as you guys are expecting. Yeah it's an Acura, but it costs less than $30k!

 

It's funny, when I was describing my new car to my European colleagues they'd ask me what an Acura is ...because no such thing exists outside of the US & Canada...
Yep, it's a Honda, built alongside the US model Accord and that value has to come from somewhere !

 

in toronto, and maybe in rest of canada, dealers now offer a lifetime warranty on those paint chips, rust, chips from stones, etc. for $1800 and they will repaint damaged portion of the car for free. i think the $1800 is worth it.

 

Actually, the US Accords are assembled in North America (including Mexico). The TSX is assembled in Japan and shipped whole.

http://www.autonews.com/files/prodcarplants.pdf