Tinting Your Windows

Tinting the windows of a car is one of the more common ways that people improve their cars or trucks. Quite often, this is something that is a person does because it is viewed as status symbol. Unfortunately, the cost of getting the windows of your car or truck can be somewhat prohibitive as it is going to cost you between $150 to $250, with the cost of increasing depending on the types of windows and the amount of prep work that is required. Why pay someone else that money, when as long as you are good at measuring and cutting, not to mention up to a challenging task, you can do the job yourself?

To begin you are going to need to gather together the following items and materials. Once you have gathered together the following items, then you are you going to ready to start your project.

• Spray bottles
• Blow dryer
• Bone tool
• Hard plastic card
• Small, 4-inch squeegee
• Tinting film
• Heat gun
• Small sponge
• Razor blades (safety razors work)
• Liquid soap detergent

For the most part, the majority of the items that you are going to need can be found around the home, or if not there then at any local department or automotive parts store. Now you are ready to start your task, all you need to do now is to decide when to do the project. It doesn't really matter whether you do it on a clear sunny day as long as you have a work space with plenty of light.

1. Get all of your tools and materials into one location, and start to prepare everything. In your spray bottle put a mixture of water and soap, measure the windows that you are going to be tinting and cut the film into the shape of the windows. Set aside the film in an area dedicated for the storage of the film.
2. Use your spray bottle and clean the windows to remove all the dirt and make sure that you have a truly clean surface. Once you have washed the area and let it dry, go over the windows with a razor and squeegee to remove any residue that may have been left behind.
3. Begin placing the tinting film on a side window. As you are placing the film onto the window, make sure that you leave between ¼" and 1/6" from the top of the window, since that will be covered when the door and window is closed. Use your bone tool to push the tint beneath the rubberized weather stripping that runs along the bottom of the window, and your hard card to make sure that the film goes into all the corners of the car's window.
4. Utilize either the heat gun, or blow dryer and the squeegee to go from one side at the top to the other. Be sure that you work in horizontal motions to help remove all remaining moisture and air bubbles from underneath the film.
5. Repeat the same steps for the other windows, with only some slight changes for the rear window of your car.
6. The slight changes are that you don't want to use the razor blade to remove any left over soap scum since this could damage the defrosting wires that are there. What you want to do is count the number of wires that are there and cut the film into the resulting number of panels. Tint the rear window working from the bottom towards the top. After you have placed all the film, go back over and trim the film away from the defroster. Be careful since this is going to take a steady hand. If necessary use a straight edge or something to help you out.