Cost and value
Ceramic paint protection in Melbourne starts from $700, and quality work with professional installation generally falls between $700 and $2,000. The spread is almost entirely about how many hours of paint correction your paint needs before anything is applied. A near-new car with straight paint sits low in that band; a swirled ten-year-old daily sits high. The full breakdown of what moves the number is on the cost guide.
Durability and maintenance
A professionally applied coating realistically lasts two to five years. Manufacturer ratings of up to five years — Gtechniq Crystal Serum Ultra is rated that way — assume a garaged car washed correctly with pH-neutral products. Street parking, brush car washes and harsh alkaline cleaners all shorten it.
Maintenance is genuinely simple, and it is not optional:
- Wash fortnightly with a pH-neutral shampoo, two buckets, and a clean mitt.
- Pressure rinse thoroughly before any contact, especially in sandy or dusty suburbs.
- Never use an automatic brush wash. It undoes the correction you paid for.
- Remove bird droppings, tree sap and lerp as soon as you see them. They are acidic and a hot afternoon is enough to etch through.
- Dry the car rather than letting it air dry, particularly where the water is hard.
Waxing over a coating is unnecessary and can mask the hydrophobic behaviour. If you want beading topped up, use a coating-specific maintenance product every six to twelve months.
The limits, stated plainly
A ceramic coating does not stop stone chips. It does not stop scratches from trolleys, keys, branches or dogs. It does not stop hail dents. It does not remove the need to wash the car. And it cannot fix paint that is already damaged — it seals in whatever is underneath it, good or bad.
If chips are the problem, paint protection film is the product that addresses them, because it is thick enough to absorb impact. If dullness is the problem, correction is what you need, with or without a coating over the top.
Melbourne-specific questions
What lands on your car depends heavily on where you park it. Salt aerosol along the bay, plane tree honeydew in the inner suburbs, eucalypt gum and lerp in the east, mineral spotting from harder water in the west, and industrial fallout in the south-east are all different problems with different maintenance answers. The service areas page covers each of them suburb by suburb.
Still unsure?
The services overview maps common complaints to the right fix, the about page explains how we quote, and the quickest route to a real answer is to call or contact us.
Frequently asked questions
How does ceramic coating protect from UV rays?
The cured coating sits above your clear coat and absorbs or reflects a share of incoming ultraviolet before it reaches the paint film. UV is what breaks down clear coat resin and fades pigment, so intercepting it is what slows the chalky, flat look that unprotected dark cars develop. The protection is partial and it degrades over years, not permanent.
Can I apply a ceramic coating myself?
Consumer products exist and they work, within limits. What you cannot easily do at home is the correction and the panel wipe, and those decide the result. The common DIY outcome is a coating cured over swirl marks with a few high spots where excess product was not levelled off in time. High spots have to be polished off, which means starting again.
What happens if the coating fails or streaks?
High spots and streaking show up in the first day or two and are caused by product not being levelled before it flashes. They are fixed by polishing the affected area and recoating it, which is why coating is done in a controlled space with proper lighting rather than in a driveway. Genuine bonding failure is rare and almost always traces back to poor surface prep.
Does a coating increase what my car sells for?
It helps present the car well, which matters, but treat any specific resale figure with suspicion because nobody can substantiate it. What is defensible is that paint kept free of etching, fade and swirls for several years looks materially better at sale time than paint that was not, and buyers do react to how a car looks in the driveway.