Army Green durability

You guys with ARMY Green trucks… how is your paint holding up? I love the color and I am contemplating getting it. How is it holding up to the elements?

How is it as far as showing swirl marks?
Bug stains on the front end?
Chips on front end?
Door dings?

I absolutely love the color, but am wondering if it’s more prone to showing defects than other colors?

 

I say it’s the only color that might be improved by trail pinstripes. It might even look better in 20 years when the clear coat wears off! Anything you do to that paint can be played off as on purpose!

(Disclaimer: i dont have army green)

 

The real question is how AWESOME does it look with mud and dirt stuck to it?

 

White is really good at hiding pinstripes.
Silver is probably 2nd.

Dark colors - not good at all.

 

I have silver currently and it can be filthy and it still looks clean. Pinstripes from off-road don’t even show up. Even chips are hard to see.

 

I will let someone who owns Army green to comment, But I would be surprised how it would be different from others holding up against showing swirl marks, bug stains, chips & door dings..

I only know of white paint is covered with a special warranty by Toyota for problems.

For sure light colors won't show much swirl marks or scratches but any scratch on plastic pieces it would be black underneath. Atleast on my white and silver 4R. Paint will scratch very easily on plastic areas.

 

That’s kind of what I was wondering- is it different than gray, black, red, blue, etc as far as durability goes?

Those other paints have been around for a decade or more. AG is fairly new.

 

I'm pretty sure all these colors been used by Toyota for decades. Eg - FJ cruiser.

Any "special" color that Toyota marketed, Toyota been used in the line up for so many years. I see no reason to fear.

Even the newest "Lime Rush"

 

I would say its no different than most Toyota paint. Definitely soft and susceptible to chips and swirls. It always looks good from a distance when dirty but has that darker color always dirty look. Its pretty cool how it changes depending on the lighting. The nice part about a 4Runner is I don’t feel like I have to baby it and worry about the dirt and scratches. Pinstripes = Character

 

Yeah, I’ll keep my 4Runner cleanish, but I won’t be waxing it nonstop like my previous black performance vehicles.

 

The paint on these vehicles suck. I looked at mine wrong and got a chip.

 

Same! Silver is incredibly boring, but at least it's low maintenance.

 

I almost picked silver for that reason, lower maintenance.
But I just couldn’t pass up the stormtrooper.

 

Yep. I was super into detailing when I had a dark colored truck. Just as a hobby. Kill time in the garage. I enjoyed it.

But now that I have silver, I lost interest in detailing. Because theres almost no difference in the before and after. Haha My silver doesn’t look any different after being waxed than it did before! So I was thinking about going for a deeper color on my next truck.

 

What saturnine said. Toyota paint sucks

 

Yes, very, very thin...

 

Toyota paint notoriously bad, since the 80s really.

People will claim it's due to EPA laws/regulations they have to use certain paints that aren’t as good as previous paints. While regs are tight, it's BS excuse because their paint has been crap since the 80s that I can recall. The EPA regulation angle would also imply there is no good way to paint a vehicle in the US which is obviously not true. Plenty of other manufacturers do a better job. Toyota just sucks at painting their vehicles. Maybe the only thing they do badly.

 

^ that and frame rust.

I think part of the problem is the paint is so thin. Maybe if they applied a thicker coat, that would help.

The paint on our 2012 has held up incredibly well, even though it doesn’t get a lot of TLC and wife uses automatic car washes.

It’s metallic brown, can’t remember the official paint color.

 

I have pearl evergreen on my 1998 4runner, its basically army green with a bit of metallic. I love the color, but I loath it on a car that will get scratches.

When the dark green gets scratched it exposes the usually white or grey primer underneath and it is VERY, VERY noticeable (this makes it super susceptible to even micro scratches). The paint also highlights where clear coat is pealing, my 4runner is doing that directly under the mirrors where its hard to wax and it looks like shit. Its my fault for not buying a better specimen paint wise, and its impossible to make it look good once it starts going, the pealing clearcoat will always contrast sections that have been waxed and the scratches will always stand out on the dark canvas. I'll post a photo of this tomorrow.

If you fuck up your army green paint, prepare for it to permanently look like shit.

Get lunar rock or whatever that TRD color is if you want something that will look good in 20 years with some off road use (or get it wrapped)

 

my plan is to repaint my hood after the first year. I feel like that’s where most of my chips are. My bumper is holding up better oddly.

 

How well does XPEL clear protectant hold up against offroading with scratches?

Does it prevent the clear coat from flaking off?

Thinking about having my next 4Runner wrapped in the stuff.

 

I too am interested in hearing from those that actually have Xpel (or equivalent) PFF. I got it priced several weeks ago and visited a local shop that was installing it on several high end vehicles (including a really nice kit car). For what I wanted done (whole front end and hood as well as lower half of all 4 doors and the lower panel on the rears...was close to $3000. I told them I would think about it!

It seems like it is a very divisive topic. Either people love it or people think you're an idiot for getting it.

 

You really gotta go hard at xpel to damage it. It’s tough as nails. I’ve heard the newer “self healing” stuff is even better.

 

I loved that old pearl green. That was a nice color.

 

I have my front end PPF with Xpel. Cant tell unless your you look really close, hood vinyl wrapped satin black a week after bringing it home. The roof will be the next thing to be wrapped. Has been holding up really well and makes it easier to clean. Main reason, last truck always had new rock chips when ever I washed it. My OCD almost wanted me to have my front end paint a 2 year old truck. As far as the AG paint, I picked up mines with light swirls from them using overused microfiber towels and going thru the car wash multiple times. Will be doing a full polish and ceramic detail after wrapping the roof. Also the color makes it stand out being majority of the 4runners here are white, gray and black.

 

What size tires you running?

 

285/70/17 Toyo Open Country AT3

 

Army Green is going to show every little scratch and swirl. It's a dark "solid" color with zero metal flake. Metal flake can hide some scratches by making them less obvious. Toyota paint sucks.

PPF helps a ton, of course. It will cost between $5-6,000 done right.

 

They look gooooood

 

I have army green on my Tundra, and as stated, it's a darker color, so you have that battle in the first place. I've found that having a black truck in the past with shine (metallic) handles scratches much better than this. This looks like garbage when scratched. I had big dogs jump on my truck excited to see me...so you can imagine how that played out...some rubbed out, but the gray primer underneath is extremely noticable. Best I found is keep that part waxxed(hybrid ceramic in my case) to hide it the best.

Its cool, but it isn't a flashy paint color anyway, so in my case, I'm at peace with it. Also, I work my truck, and trail with it anyway...so it doesn't matter a whole lot.