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The article claims that it saves money, rather than costing extra.

jcims 5y ago
I think that is relative to custom paint vs existing manual methods. That i would agree with, i just don’t see this replacing single tone paint methods. Which likely wasn't why it was built, so not sure why i'm pointing that out haha.
smoyer 5y ago
Looking at the orange base-coat in the video, I'd suggest it saves money versus hand-painted custom paint jobs but as every surface of the car (inside doors) are orange, I'd say that was applied by the traditional robot painters (with HVLP guns).
baron816 5y ago
It saves BMW money. You still have to pay more.
- dylan604 5y ago
  I'm trying to think of a company that provides the customer an extra personalization service that did not charge more for it... I got nothing.
  - akiselev 5y ago
    Off the top of my head: tailors embroider the clothing they make for customers and luxury clothing companies like Luis Vuitton engrave the customer's name or a message on products like wallets. IIRC even Apple used to engrave custom messages on some of their products for free.
    - tinus_hn 5y ago
      Apple still offers free engraving on selected products: https://www.apple.com/shop/engraving-and-gift-wrap https://www.apple.com/shop/engraving-and-gift-wrap
      - SV_BubbleTime 5y ago
        And this still hurts secondary market sales, which may or may not be Apple’s plan, we’ll never know.
        culturestate 5y ago
        I would think that if they were really trying to check the secondary market, they’d allow engraving for iPhones. Surely that’s by far the one that cuts most deeply into the bottom line.
        tinus_hn 5y ago
        That evil Apple with their evil free engraving schemes!
    - sujinge9 5y ago
      Custom embroiders/engraves are basically a way to reduce the second hand market as fewer people want to buy a luxury product with someone else's name on it.
jandrese 5y ago
It saves money in air compressor energy costs, but the article glosses over how long this takes compared to traditional methods. If it takes 10 times as long to paint a car this way then you have to replicate it 10 times in the factory to maintain the same rate of production which could very easily end up costing more. On the other hand, masking is a pain in the ass and takes a lot of time so this could end up being faster all around so long as you're comparing with complex multi-tone paintjobs.

I think that is relative to custom paint vs existing manual methods. That i would agree with, i just don’t see this replacing single tone paint methods. Which likely wasn't why it was built, so not sure why i'm pointing that out haha.

smoyer 5y ago

Looking at the orange base-coat in the video, I'd suggest it saves money versus hand-painted custom paint jobs but as every surface of the car (inside doors) are orange, I'd say that was applied by the traditional robot painters (with HVLP guns).

baron816 5y ago

It saves BMW money. You still have to pay more.

dylan604 5y ago
I'm trying to think of a company that provides the customer an extra personalization service that did not charge more for it... I got nothing.
- akiselev 5y ago
  Off the top of my head: tailors embroider the clothing they make for customers and luxury clothing companies like Luis Vuitton engrave the customer's name or a message on products like wallets. IIRC even Apple used to engrave custom messages on some of their products for free.
  - tinus_hn 5y ago
    Apple still offers free engraving on selected products: https://www.apple.com/shop/engraving-and-gift-wrap https://www.apple.com/shop/engraving-and-gift-wrap
    - SV_BubbleTime 5y ago
      And this still hurts secondary market sales, which may or may not be Apple’s plan, we’ll never know.
      - culturestate 5y ago
        I would think that if they were really trying to check the secondary market, they’d allow engraving for iPhones. Surely that’s by far the one that cuts most deeply into the bottom line.
      - tinus_hn 5y ago
        That evil Apple with their evil free engraving schemes!
  - sujinge9 5y ago
    Custom embroiders/engraves are basically a way to reduce the second hand market as fewer people want to buy a luxury product with someone else's name on it.

jandrese 5y ago

It saves money in air compressor energy costs, but the article glosses over how long this takes compared to traditional methods. If it takes 10 times as long to paint a car this way then you have to replicate it 10 times in the factory to maintain the same rate of production which could very easily end up costing more. On the other hand, masking is a pain in the ass and takes a lot of time so this could end up being faster all around so long as you're comparing with complex multi-tone paintjobs.