[Serendibb]

Hi Guys,

I've searched through the forum but I don't think I've seen any conclusive answer as to whether your comprehensive insurance will be void if you put on tints which are darker then the darkest Legal in NSW. (Darkest legal is 35% VLT) I'm thinking of getting about 20% VLT as I don't think 35 % is really dark.

Also, has anyone tinted the top 10% of your front windscreen?

Cheers!

[donc]

I think if you do anything to modify a vehicle that is intentionally illegal then any liabilities on your insurer could (and should) be void - although personally I would be more worried about getting a defect notice and the vehicle put off the road by your friendly neighborhood police officer - then you would need to rip-off that new and expensive dark tinting just to drive the car home!

[Rubix]

I think if you do anything to modify a vehicle that is intentionally illegal then any liabilities on your insurer could (and should) be void - although personally I would be more worried about getting a defect notice and the vehicle put off the road by your friendly neighborhood police officer - then you would need to rip-off that new and expensive dark tinting just to drive the car home!

After getting a quote from my local tinting place, and hearing that a lot of people get darker-than-legal tint, I started having a look around at the different cars driving around... there are a LOT of cars with darker-than-legal tint. Once you know what the legal limit looks like, you can look through a car and see with your bare eyes if the car is too dark or not. I've seen a black SUV with windows so dark you cannot see through the other side of the car. And no, it wasn't in the PM's entourage.

[Serendibb]

Thanks for the reply!

I would have thought that adding another 10-15% to the legal limit for tinting would be hard to notice without a side by side comparison? Wouldn't the different types of tint (smoke, charcoal etc) alter the actual look of how dark the tint is while still being darkest legal?

[donc]

I've seen a black SUV with windows so dark you cannot see through the other side of the car

That's interesting as it might have been mine  8) - As well as the i30 I also own a black SUV with tinted windows and depending on the light you cannot always see through the vehicle - although the level of tinting is within legal limits. Anything darker could be dangerous under some driving conditions.

Nonetheless none of this negates the law - your question was whether or not deliberately illegally modifying a vehicle would void your insurance, and the answer is yes. The exception is to get an engineers certificate approving the level of tint you wish to apply and have this accepted by the RTA. That some people break the law (and are either uninsured or don't care if their insurer chooses not to pay a claim), doesn't change any of this!

[Serendibb]

Oh well, guess I have to stick with the legal range then as I don't want to risk the chance of having an insurance claim going out of the window because of the tint.

However, anybody knows what's the best shade of tint to look darker then darkest legal? I've heard that Smoke Tint is the way to go. Anybody have any experience with that? Should I start another thread for this question? Cheers.

[donc]

PS - Our i30 is also tinted to the legal maximum and it's excellent for reducing glare and helping to keep the car cool (plus it looks fantastic with red bodywork) - still I would not want it any darker as this would be dangerous at night, in fog or heavy rain etc.

Pic of our car showing the level of tinting below...

[Serendibb]

Looks really good donc! What type of tint did you put on? Also, do you happen to tint the top of your front windscreen too?

[donc]

Unfortunately I really don't know what type of tint it is - was organized by the dealer and provided as a free extra under the original purchase package. My only request was that it be as dark as legally allowable. Tinting the top of the windscreen would have involved removing the existing small tinted area behind the rear view mirror so I didn't worry about it.

[Rubix]

from my understanding, the legal liability for the insurance company would be a) did the tinting impair your driving ability? (you could prove it wasn't relevant if you hit them from in front, but maybe not from the side?) but more importantly, b) was your vehicle 'roadworthy' and 'free from defect' when you were driving - in this case they could snake out of your claim even if you hit the other car head on.
Question is - will the insurance assessor get a meter out to check the light% of your windows? Probably not if you're only 5% darker than legal (ie 30%), but maybe he'll visually decide no-liability if you're down 10% or more (25%-5% VLT).

If you decide to only 3rd party insure your vehicle, and the other person is deemed at fault, their insurance assessor cannot defect your vehicle - it doesn't even matter if your car is unregistered, they have to pay for the damage or value of the vehicle regardless (as far as I understand it).

[donc]

If you decide to only 3rd party insure your vehicle, and the other person is deemed at fault, their insurance assessor cannot defect your vehicle

Conversely... If you are deemed to be at fault in the above scenario and it's known that you deliberately and illegally modified your vehicle, (maybe from a post made here!), a negligent driving charge could easily escalate to a manslaughter charge or worse.

No matter how you look at it.. breaking the law is breaking the law. Get caught and there will be consequences (not getting an insurance payout may be the least of your problems!)

[Serendibb]

Donc: I'm pretty sure that the tint at the top of the windscreen will go over the existing patch because all the company cars in my company have that tint and they also have this small patch of dots behind the mirror (Commodores).

Rubix: I've already got Comprehensive Insurance on it that's why it's causing me so much headache. On one hand, I'll like it to look dark so that it complement that Black colour of the car (yes, I'm vain). On the other hand, I don't want to spend so much money on Comprehensive and then get voided IF I have an accident because of some window tint! Looks like there's no way out of this re insurance. I just have to hunt for the correct type of tint that might look darker then 35% VLT.

I had a look at Solartint and they told me they use films from Madico Inc in the USA. They also have Omega tints in some of their store. However, from all the research I've done, these film companies don't really blip on the internet. Anybody else have experience with Solartint and recommendation as to the best colour to choose to make your car looks dark?

Oops, Donc posted while I was typing the reply. Yeah. I think you're right. I've reached the conclusion that it's better to just stick with darkest legal.

[donc]

Donc: I'm pretty sure that the tint at the top of the windscreen will go over the existing patch because all the company cars in my company have that tint and they also have this small patch of dots behind the mirror

On the i30 this small area of tinting is quite raised and I think it would be difficult to tint over the top of it - would either need to be removed or the new tinting cut to go around it... either way it wasn't (and isn't) a priority for us because most or our driving is on 'leafy' country roads. I like the idea of being able to see out the top of the windscreen when it's a bit dark or during storms - helps to be able to see to dodge the falling branches!

[Rubix]

I'm getting my tinting from Solartint (Link_1111 had his done there and was happy), I'll probably go 30% back & back-sides and 35% front-sides. I'm happy with that level of risk - I can understand if others aren't. Solartint has been around for a while - my parents had a car done by them over 15 years ago, but tinting has changed a bit since then.

The 'Omega' tint is supposed to be better with GPS navigation - I'll be taking a GPS to check the non-Omega before I make my decision on that.

[emacmark]

I have just had my i30 crdi tinted by tint-a-car in Townsville with F1 film all round. It is the darkest legal and UV A and B. I highly recommend it. It has made a huge difference to the heat penetration whilst the car is out in the ample sun up here. It also looks very cool.

[Serendibb]

Rubix: Arh, has anyone else have problems with Metalised tints and mobile phones? I know that there were issues with Radios and metalised tint but our aerial sits on top of the car. I don't normally use a GPS so that's not too much a worry for me.

emacmark: having a claim of rejecting UV A and B is something I haven't seen on other films (most just say they have 99% UV rejection). Did you choose the F1 film over the midnight express because of the heat rejection?

[Waja]

I had just gotten the darkest legal (even though I wanted a darker tint because its alot more appealing) just because I had comprehensive insurance and I didn't want anything to be pulled up as a potential flaw or anything in an accident.

I had gone with the Type: Contour Color: Onyx  at Solartint and it does the job for me? Although it isn't too dark, it keeps out ALOT of heat compared to when I drove in and it also does look a bit more appealing.

I haven't run into any problems with GPS' or mobiles not working, but I'm not sure if mine is metalized or not.

Personally, in the end, i just went with the darkest legal tint that had the greatest amount of UV and heat reflection and kept my car 'street legal' and even though its not as dark as I wanted, I wouldn't change it if I was given the choice  8) Hope that helps

[Rubix]

yeah Link, Onyx is supposed to be the titanium-metallised tint. I dunno what the contour thing means though? What does the type: contour refer to?
And Solartint's Onyx has the same UV A & B blah blah. As mentioned somewhere here or in my tinting-web-browsing-travels, the glass of your windows is actually doing most of the UV reduction. But there's no doubting the effectiveness of privacy and light & heat reduction provided by tinting.

[Serendibb]

OK! Booked the car into a local SolarTint shop. Will see what happens this weekend. Thanks guys for all your info!

[emacmark]

I went for F1 film as it was tint-a-cars premium film. I really have no idea about other films.

I went to tint-a-car as it had a 10yr warranty and is an Australia wide franchise, so I am covered if and when i move again. That may not be important to some, but we have a good chance of moving again in 5-8 yrs time.

Good luck with your tint.

[Waja]

emacmark, you say that you went for tint-a-car since it has a 10year warranty right?

I went with solartint because it has a LIFETIME service AND tint warranty...thing is that the tint usually only starts to bubble after 10 years (if you still have your car then)

[i30 Roolz]

Pic of our car showing the level of tinting below...

Holy smoke! Looks great! 

[donc]

Thanks Roolz... it is purty 

[Serendibb]

Well, went to Solartint West Ryde and got the car tinted on Sunday with darkest legal tint. It was Lifetime warranty covered by Solar tint but the actual person doing it wasn't able to describe the actual tint itself - "We have black, green and grey colour. All metalised"

However, it's cheap and they did give me a strip on the front windscreen no problem. Tested it out over the weekend (parked in Bunnings carpark for 2 hours under direct sunlight) and the chocolates in the glove box is still chill  . Overall pretty happy with it but still need to wait another couple of hours before I can wind down the windows to have a look at the edges.

[emacmark]

emacmark, you say that you went for tint-a-car since it has a 10year warranty right?

I went with solartint because it has a LIFETIME service AND tint warranty...thing is that the tint usually only starts to bubble after 10 years (if you still have your car then)

I re read the tint-a-car warranty info and it too Has lifetime service and tint. However, my main concern is as i am likely to move i need a service agent in my new locality. Tint-a-car has far superior network at this stage to cover such long warrenties.

But as i mentioned, this may not be as important to others as it is to me.

Up here in Townsville, the tinting has a huge effect on the ambient temp in car between drives. This is my first ever car with tinting so i hope it keeps performing well, but at only $300 i dont think i would even worry if the film failed after 10years. I would consider it to have been worth its money and done its job. I'd just go and get it re done.

[Rubix]

Tested it out over the weekend (parked in Bunnings carpark for 2 hours under direct sunlight) and the chocolates in the glove box is still chill  . Overall pretty happy with it but still need to wait another couple of hours before I can wind down the windows to have a look at the edges.

Is that before or after you turned the car back on? You know we have air-conditioned-cooling-glove-boxes right? I love the i30.

[Serendibb]

Haha, definitely before mate. The chocolates were for my sister which I intend to visit after my shopping but the Bunnings I went into was huge so it took longer then I expected. The first thing I checked after I came out were the chocolates and I have to give the tints a big tick for heat reduction.

On the other note, I've lowered my front windows now that 48 hours are over and I notice that there is a 2mm gap at the top of the window between tint and window. The tint goes almost to the edge on the diagonal part. Is that normal?

[Rubix]

yes, once the windows are closed the tint will reach the top of the window, so that's all they cover to. If they covered to the edge the edge of the tint would catch and could come off.

[Pikapolonica]

My baby is booked in for tinting at Tint a Car on 8 Jan as that's the only tinting company in Geelong (well there's Tintmaster).  I'm tossing up between the F1 and Midnight Express.  Going in this Wednesday to see how they look on samples.  In the past I've had ME on both cars.

Anyone know what kind of tint the Bollé is?  With this, you get free sunnies?

I think ME is approx $495.

[emacmark]

F1 cost me $350 each for both my i30 and my wifes getz.

I suppose we have more competition up here though.

Mark