How to Avoid “From Entry to Giving up” Quickly in Car Modification for Beginners?
For beginners, not violating the law and not causing trouble is the first step to avoid “from entry to giving up” quickly. Let’s read the “Regulations on Motor Vehicle Registration” and the “Road Traffic Safety Law” carefully, and understand the legal areas for novice modification.
In the revised “Implementation Regulations of the Road Traffic Safety Law” on October 7, 2017, it is clearly stated that for vehicles that have been registered and licensed, modifications are required:
Doesn’t it seem to point to the fact that the body color, engine, body, and frame can all be replaced? After the replacement, just register it? Not really. Please refer to the description of vehicle modification in the “Regulations on the Registration of Motor Vehicles” approved by GA Department Order No. 124:
Surprised? After the engine, body, and frame are replaced, they cannot be registered if they do not match the original model. Changes in appearance and related technical data cannot be registered;
The size parameters and technical parameters of the engine must not be changed, which limits the modification of various aerodynamic kits and power upgrades;
The body color needs to be filed for changes, and car stickers that do not exceed 30% of the body size are the most basic and almost the only range allowed by regulations. Of course, one more thing is that the design style of the hub can be replaced under the same size parameters;
It seems that the only remaining mission for novice villages is to change the body color and replace the hub design style without changing the size parameters artificially.
How to Get Started on the Novice Village Mission?
Since we need to change the body color, we must have a high-end modification route, create a style and taste for modifications. My advice is to take a look at various cool and meaningful super-luxury brands and see how they do it.
This Bentley Continental GT with a ski board on its top and snow mountain paint and graphics is the only exclusive custom-made one;
These Rolls-Royces, which light up like neon lights, are called Black Badge Neon Nights Collection.First of all, let’s welcome Ferrari, whose name for its high-end customization service is very advanced – “Tailor Made”, the same name as hand-tailored custom clothing. The service process is similar to other brands. The exclusive customization designer listens to the customer’s expectations and preferences and creates a tailored design scheme. What sets Ferrari apart is that the brand divides its customization series into the following three parts:
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Scuderia series, which draws inspiration from Ferrari’s rich racing history, pursues the ultimate sporty style;
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Classica series, which draws inspiration from Ferrari’s classic road models throughout history, aims for modern interpretation of classic style;
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Inedita series, which focuses on pursuing innovation and unprecedented materials, details and experiences, and realizes various experimental plans on Ferrari’s modern models.
The third category relies too much on the pursuit of material details that surpass the cost of super luxury brands, and the requirements for novice tasks are too harsh. However, the first two categories are good inspirations. Since the modern interpretation of classic style and racing history can make super wealthy customers spend heavily, it should also be a good taste bonus to appear on their own small cars.
The general modification plan can also be developed according to the customization ideas of super luxury brands:
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Choose a tribute car model, preferably of the same brand. Choosing across brands risks being accused of being ostentatious.
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The classic paint scheme of the tribute car model will be the choice of exterior paint.
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The livery and decoration of the tribute car model will serve as inspiration for graphics and decorations.The early racing history of various car brands has left many classic stories, such as Porsche’s Pink Pig livery, Honda’s Spoon livery, Toyota’s Celica WRC livery, and so on. In recent years, domestic car companies have also accumulated many classic liveries by introducing brands and participating in sports events, such as Lynk & Co’s WTCR Cyan Racing livery, MG’s classic speed record livery and later X Power racing livery, and so on.
Of course, everyone’s ideas can also not be limited by the routine of super-rich friends. In addition to paying tribute to classic car models, cultural liveries, such as cartoon animations and movie collaborations, are also good creative choices.
To do tasks in the novice village, you also need good equipment as a basis. A good modification plan, even just changing the livery, also requires a good car model as the foundation. How to select a novice entry-level car model?
Changing the color of the car body is the easiest and most likely to become a facade modification that looks gaudy. The texture of the color-changing film is difficult to achieve with modern car paint technology. A high-quality car paint is the best foundation for appearance modification.Years ago, only complex car coating techniques were available in ultra-luxury and luxury brands. However, in recent years, more and more ordinary joint venture brands and even domestic automakers have started using them. For example, even in a small car worth around 80,000 yuan, you can see highly saturated color choices and gradient coating options with different visual effects from different angles. Using such factory coatings as a basis to cosplay Pikachu or create a personalized small car with a psychedelic urban style will certainly not disappoint.
In collaboration with the world’s leading automotive coatings supplier, BASF, this 80,000 yuan car features two eye-catching factory coating options: Nuclear Energy Yellow and Cyber Grey. The Nuclear Energy Yellow is produced with high chroma waterborne pigment and MOFA process grinding, making the coating thickness up to 120 mm. It overcomes problems like poor coverage of light color pigments and high tone angle adjustment difficulties, achieving high transparency, high purity, color stability. On the other hand, Cyber Grey is created with a FLIP-FLOP process that produces varying reflective effects under sunlight thanks to a special “vertically arranged chip structure” in the paint. It changes from grey-blue to silver and then to purple-red, switching between warm and cold colors at will, just like a strange world in a science fiction movie.
Exquisite and transparent, rich and changeable coating techniques are available in the 80,000 yuan market, making them particularly suitable for novice equipment.
Since exterior accessories or aerodynamic packages cannot be installed to change the body proportions and exterior data, it means that an excellent body proportion design is also a necessary foundation for exterior modification. With a more perfect design proportion as a foundation, the perfect visual effect has the hardware foundation guaranteed.
At different price points and body types, every designer hopes to achieve a more excellent design proportion. In fact, the design proportion here follows some unwritten rules numerically. Following these rules means that the visual effect can be more satisfying, such as lower car height for sedan models, lowering the front of sports cars as much as possible, and making the cowl point where the hood and windshield meet as vertically low as possible. The proportion of side windows and sheet metal should be as close to 1:2 as possible. For front engine cars, the extension of the A-pillar can pass through the wheel center point or behind it. The front overhang length before the front wheel center position should be as short as possible. However, due to many restrictions on the vehicle platform, designers often need to find some design techniques to achieve the optimal visual effect.Examples of car models that prove this point include the most elegant GT in the ultra-luxury segment, the most extreme supercar and four-door coupe in the luxury segment, as well as affordable models in the standard segment.
The first example is the previous generation Bentley Continental GT. The designer of Bentley made a very clever operation on the front fender and the side of the entire body, shaping a false waistline through surface changes and lowering the visual center of the onlookers. As long as it is not parked beside competitors of the same level, it perfectly presents a low waistline posture.
Comparing the four-door supercar and coupe models in the luxury segment, the AMG GT two-door and four-door models are excellent examples. The former is a pure front-mid-engine, rear transaxle design that sacrifices space and provides a lower seating position for the sports car model, while the latter is derived from a conventional four-door executive car platform, and certain design techniques are used to compensate for the proportional shortcomings. Specifically, a larger slope is used to hide the heavy front-end on the extension line of the front grille on the hood and the outer edge of the hood, guiding the visual height of the front end and cowl point to the false waistline that extends from the rear of the headlights on the fender. From a distance, it appears to have a similar effect to the wide and low front end of the AMG GT two-door.
The affordable car model in the standard segment is the all-new MG5 priced at around 80,000 yuan. The designer tried to create a sports car-inspired proportion by lowering the front edge of the car and making it look almost similar in proportion to some luxury brand coupe models when viewed from the front. At the same time, a Fastback design is adopted at the rear end, with the C-pillar pulling the visual center rearward on a front-wheel-drive platform, creating a high-end coupe proportion with a low front and a high rear and a rearward visual center. Meanwhile, a false waistline is also created on the fender above the front headlights, along the door edge and above the rear wheel, which is similar to the design techniques used in the aforementioned Continental GT and AMG GT four-door coupe. With such million-level design techniques as a foundation, this is truly a basic but essential option for entry-level appearance enthusiasts.
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This article is a translation by ChatGPT of a Chinese report from 42HOW. If you have any questions about it, please email bd@42how.com.