Window Tint Benefits
Brief Overview
While heat rejection is the most obvious and familiar benefit of window tint, there are many other great benefits that tinting your car provides you and your vehicle!
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Let's take a look at all the features that make window tint not just a great option, but a necessity all year round, especially in Colorado!
Heat Rejection
First and foremost, we have to talk about what automotive tint is best known for, and that's heat rejection. It's incredibly important to not that not all films are created equally. What's considered top of the line by one shop may be the lowest grade film at another!
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When looking for the best bang for your buck, you'll want to ask for the exact manufacturer and line of film being applied. You can then look up the technical specifications of that film to ensure it performs as advertised.
The main things to look out for are TSER, IRR, UVR, VLT, and Solar Absorption.
Key Points
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Not all films are created equally. Check the specifications to make sure you're getting a quality film.
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TSER is the best gauge for heat rejection.
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VLT is the shade of your tint. Lower % = darker. Higher % = lighter.
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IRR can be misrepresented by manufacturers, and isn't as important as TSER.
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UV rejection should be a minimum of 99%.
TSER stands for Total Solar Energy Rejection, and is honestly the most important indicator of how well a particular window film performs.
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TSER combines how well the tint blocks Visible Light, Infrared Light (IR), and UV light (both UVA and UVB). There's some complex math involved that we won't get into here, but just know that a film with a higher TSER percentage will keep your car cooler for longer.
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Since Visible Light is taken into account, a darker film will always have a higher TSER value than a lighter film. When looking for maximum heat rejection for you and your vehicle, you'll want to go with the highest TSER value you can get for the shade that you want.
Privacy & Security
Window tint isn't just about the heat rejection! While heat rejection is a huge factor with the heat we see in Colorado, there are plenty of other reasons to tint your car.
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By making your windows darker, it makes it much harder to see into the car, while still easy to see out of. While it may seem a bit confusing how that works, just think of wearing sunglasses. You can still see just fine since it's so bright outside, but other people can't really see your eyes.
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While you can enjoy not being stared at while sitting at a stop light, the biggest benefit is deterring theft. Since it's so much harder to see into your car, any valuables you might have inside will be much safer from prying eyes. Ideally, any would-be-thief will just leave your car alone if they can't see the nice bag or laptop you left in your car.
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Sure, heat rejection might be at the top of your list, but if not, we recommend just going with our Carbon film. It's our most budget friendly option, still provides great heat rejection, and provides all the other benefits that a higher-end film does.
Key Points
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Makes windows harder to see into, but still easy to see out of.
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Great theft deterrent since it's harder to see anything inside your car.
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If you don't need the most heat rejection, our Carbon film is cheaper and still provides privacy and security.
Shatter Resistant
Another lesser known benefit of car tint is that it adds significant shatter resistance to your windows.
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All of our window films are incredibly durable, and while not bulletproof, window tint can help hold your glass together during an accident or severe weather. It's very similar to how a windshield breaks compared to your side windows without tint.
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However, side and rear windows are usually always tempered, and when broken, shatter into thousands tiny pieces. While this is much safer than traditional glass that breaks into dangerous shards, these tiny pieces can still cause significant harm in a bad accident.
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Window tint helps to hold all these pieces together since they're essentially all glued together on a single sheet. This keeps all those small pieces from flying around your car and potentially causing additional harm.
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While tempered glass is designed to break this way in order to help people get out of a car if the door is stuck shut or the car is underwater, don't worry! While the window tint will hold the pieces together, it doesn't hold the window in place. The whole sheet can easily be pushed or pulled out of the way in case of emergency.
Key Points
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Holds shattered glass together to prevent flying glass from causing harm.
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Increased protection in an accident or severe weather.
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More difficult to break windows in the case of vandalism or theft.
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Does NOT hold glass the glass firmly in the door in case of emergency. The film and glass can easily be moved out of the window frame.
Resale Value
While adding window tint alone might not get you much extra when it's time to sell your car, a pristine interior absolutely will!
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Without window tint, the damaging UV light that gets into your car can cause premature failure of nearly every surface in your vehicle. Dashboards of any material can crack and fade, leather is especially prone to cracking as well as trim pieces, and fabric can fade and even become sun bleached.
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All of these can greatly impact the value of your vehicle! I guess if you never plan on selling your car, it's not that big of an issue. You can probably agree that having a 20 year old car with a good looking interior is a lot nicer to drive though!
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Thankfully, all of this damage can easily be avoided with high quality auto tint that blocks a minimum of 99% UV. If you're reading this currently, then you're in luck! We refuse to stock any film that doesn't meet that 99% UV blocking minimum.
So whether you're on a budget and want to go with our Carbon line, you're looking for the absolute best of the best with Autobahn i3, or anything in between, you can have the peace of mind knowing your interior is safe!
Key Points
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Harmful UV rays can damage your dashboard, trim, seats, and more.
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Sun damaged interiors negatively impact the value of your vehicle.
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High quality window tint blocks 99%+ of these UV rays to protect your interior and increase resale value.
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All of the films we offer, every shade and every line, meet the 99% UV blocking minimum.
EV Range & MPG
So what's with all these claims of window tint increasing EV range and improving gas mileage?​
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The theory is all there, A/C units require energy to function. In a gas or diesel car, that A/C unit is ran with a belt from your engine. While your A/C is on, it will require some extra effort from your engine to make up for the added resistance.
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For an EV, everything is powered by electricity, and any additional use of electricity will reduce how much power is available for actual driving. This includes A/C usage, playing music, powering screens, using your blinkers, everything.
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Window tint reduces the amount of heat and visible light entering your vehicle, meaning you can use your A/C less. For EV's, this also means your screen brightness can be reduced as well. This is all well and good, but does it really make a difference?
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There's lots of arguing about the true impact of A/C usage on range for both combustion and electric vehicles. The exact numbers are all over the place, but the simple answer is yes, window tint can improve gas mileage and EV range. However, it is likely rather marginal and varies wildly depending on your exact vehicle.
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Should window tint as a range-extender be a massive selling point, probably not. Does it actually improve driving range, probably yes. Just don't fall victim to any claims that tint will provide massive range improvements. There are tons of other great benefits of window tint that far outweigh any fuel economics.
Key Points
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Window tint keeps your interior cooler, reducing the need for A/C usage.
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Less A/C usage means less draw from your engine or battery.
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This can increase driving range, but is likely marginal and dependent on too many factors to be conclusive.
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Tint offers many other benefits that far outweigh the potential increase of driving range for any vehicle.
Glare & Visibility
If you're tired of all the squinting and low visibility from driving into the sun during morning and evening commutes, window tint is a great solution!
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But hold on, doesn't window tint make windows harder to see out of since they'll be darker? Not entirely.
While going with a super dark tint can hinder visibility at night, lighter shades can actually drastically improve visibility during the day. Back to that sunglasses analogy, window tint helps cut down the amount of light entering your car, and therefor your eyes.
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Reducing the harsh light from the sun can let you keep your yes on the road, see stop lights and signage better, and generally keep you safer while driving!
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If you're ever concerned about visibility, we've got plenty of personal and shop vehicles parked at the shop with varying degrees of tint and we're happy to let you check them out from the inside! While every car is a bit different with the number and size of windows, this should help you decide the perfect shade for you!
Key Points
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Harsh light from the sun can make driving more dangerous, especially at sunrise and sunset.
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Window tint reduces harsh light to increase visibility.
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Feel free to ask to see an example in person! We've got heat displays as well as tinted vehicles to help you make your decision.
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While most tint can improve visibility, going too dark can reduce visibility at night.