German Company Says Forget The Primer, Just Ceramic Coat The Whole Thing

No idea what ceramic is like at the nano level, but at sizes slightly larger it is brittle and doesn't do well with flexing. I'm sure it's a totally different story with this process, but...

Ferrari uses a ceramic coat after painting, not as a primer. The result though is a harder finish that is resistant to scratches.

And prone to fires apparently ;)

A car company's annual sales volume is in the hundreds of millions and all they save annually is $500,000? They can do that by just turning off the lights on the weekends, what the hell sort of savings is this?

"All told, the new process can save an auto maker $500,000 annually when it is retrofitted in a brownfield facility, even more when installed at a greenfield site, Wohletz says."

It gets worse.. the choice of words "can save" implies that at most, it saves you up to $500,000, but it's likely you'll save less than that.

crappy technology that doesn't put a dent in the consumer's wallet

the biggest benefit is environmental because it's non-phosphate. phosphates are horrible pollutants.

wow painting ... im so excited

The biggest problem is scratch prevention. If a deep scratch gets through all the paint and primer layers, there is no stopping rust of the underlying steel unless the entire area is refinished properly. The best way to avoid rust altogether is to replace ordinary steel with stainless steel, aluminum, or plastic. Ford built a one-off stainless steel car in the forties but went on to produce rust buckets in later decades and Saturn cars used plastic body panels until recently but went back to steel for ease of manufacturing and other reasons. Audi A8 and Jaguar XJ are current pricier examples of aluminum-bodied cars. I recall a more popularly priced French aluminum car, Panhard, which unfortunately is no longer made. Not too many can afford the current RR Phantom which also has an alumimun body. I do believe that aluminum is the most cost-effective way to achieve lowest life-cycle cost and highest pleasure of ownership by having a rust-free body during the entire life of the car. Attention sales guys at Alcoa and Alcan: your assignment for the balance of this decade is to get 25% of the world's cars to adopt aluminum bodies. And that is just a start with higher targets to be set in future decades. Attention steel producers: your assignment is to ensure that all automotive sheet steel is heavily galvanized, hot dipped or to a specification of at least 150 grams per square meter if electrogalvanized.

A rusting car body is simply unacceptable with all the technology available today.

Stainless steel, a la Delorean, is heavy and expensive, and therefore neither cost effective, nor fuel efficient.

The future is with polymers, like carbon fiber and advanced painting techniques like this article gets into. Polymers are stronger than steel, lighter than aluminum, and do not rust or oxidize, and paint is optional.