The hardtop of a Jeep is one of the most iconic features of the vehicle. That’s why keeping them in sleek and glossy appearance is critical for a lot of Jeep owners.
Having the hardtop of your Jeep painting won’t only restore your vehicle to mint condition but will also increase the value of your lovely ride. Also, some owners might consider painting the hardtop to match the color of their vehicle.
So can you paint a Jeep hardtop? Luckily, you can! Yet, there are some considerations to keep in mind.
This includes factors like the number and depth of the scratches you have and the reason why you need to paint in the first place. If you want to know more about painting your Jeep’s hardtop, keep on reading!
Reasons to Paint a Jeep Hardtop
Now that you know that painting a Jeep hardtop is possible, it’s time to know when to actually do it. In the following list, you’ll find some of the factors that would make you consider getting a paint job for your Jeep hardtop:
1. Excessive Exposure to Sunlight
There are various causes for your Jeep hardtop to fade. However, excessive exposure to sunlight might be the most common culprit.
Jeep hardtops are made from a very durable type of plastic. This one is designed to power through all kinds of driving conditions as well as weather.
However, even with its tough construction, the UV rays can still break down the loose chemical bonds between the polymer molecules.
This natural process is known as “photodegradation”, and it happens to plastics as they get exposed to the sun.
Couple that with other milder but consistent factors, such as weather conditions and the age of the hardtop, and it becomes pretty inevitable.
If you usually park your Jeep somewhere where it stays under strong sunlight, you should expect the hardtop to look dull and fade away. In that case, repainting is always necessary.
2. Personal Preference or Improvement
Another simple reason for giving your Jeep hardtop a makeover is that you simply don’t like the color and want to go for a new one.
Also, if you buy a used Jeep and the previous owner has a modified hardtop paint that doesn’t meet your expectations or fades pretty fast. In that case, you might want to apply a new coat of paint of a higher quality.
3. Touch Ups for the Small Scratches
Jeeps are among the best offroading vehicles on the planet, and it’s one of the main reasons many Jeep owners have them in the first place.
During your nature trails or expeditions, the harsh environment might leave a print on your paint coat.
This can happen due to rough tree branches and rocks that you might come in contact with, especially while driving through narrow valley roads. In fact, some people take pride in these “adventure scars”, as they call them.
4. Accidents
The last and most unfortunate reason is, of course, accidents. Whether the car is moving or stationary, the hardtop might get damaged for some reason.
In that case, painting the jeep hardtop might be necessary to restore the vehicle to its original condition.
How to Paint a Jeep Hardtop
If you have some minor scratches, it won’t require serious effort or money to paint it. Instead, you can cover up almost all the small scratches with a premium Jeep touch up paint.
We recommend using Mopar Paint because it’s designed specifically for painting the Jeep hardtops.
As for bigger scratches that leave a mark in the fiberglass layer, they might need prepping and degreasing before applying the coat of paint. If you can still see the scratches, a full repaint might be the solution for this issue.
When professionals paint the whole hardtop, they first sand out, degrease, and mask the entire top to get it buffed out and ready for a whole new paint job.
Can (and Should) You Do it on Your Own?
The answer to this question relies on many factors. The biggest of these factors is always the simplicity of the job.
On one hand, if you’re only planning to touch up the scratches on your Jeep, it would be much more cost-efficient to do it yourself than going to a paint shop for the job.
In that case, all you need to do is get a premium-quality touch-up paint and follow a good guide. This shouldn’t take too much time or effort depending on the number of scratches you’re looking forward to fixing.
On the other hand, if the job is a little bit more complicated, such as repainting the whole hardtop, the process will be a lot more labor-intensive and costly.
Not only that, but the process of sanding down the entire coat of paint and masking the vehicle requires some specific power tools that are too expensive on their own, such as electric sanders.
In that case, it’s always wiser to leave the whole thing to a professional. So, unless you’re an expert in paint jobs, have the needed tools, and know your way around the job, you might regret the time and money wasted doing it on your own.
That’s why, for a lot of Jeep owners, the extra money saved by doing the job themselves is not worth the trouble.
How Much Does it Cost to Paint the Hardtop in a Jeep?
The costs will vary depending on the complexity of the job. For a few touch-ups that you can do yourself, it’ll only cost you the price of the supplies you’ll need.
However, for a full hardtop repaint, the intensive sanding and masking going into the process might cost you as much as $2,000 to $3,000.
Wrap Up
With that said, you now know how and why you’d need to paint a jeep hardtop. So, can you paint a Jeep hardtop? As you can see, you can paint the jeep hardtop easily, if you’re only doing some simple touch-ups
In that case, you might only need a suitable quality touch up paint like Mopar. However, if you want to repaint the whole hardtop, it would always be better to leave the job for a professional.
The process requires a lot of expertise, patience, and effort. Moreover, it will require special tools that you might not have in your garage.