In the 1930s, Mercedes-Benz did not paint its Silver Arrows racing cars to reduce weight, but the polished aluminum was a very easy-care finish, while DeLoreans had bare stainless steel bodies that had fingerprints on them.
In 1999, Fiat recognized the drawbacks of painting its Ecobasic concept car, which had plain plastic panels and no paint, but the idea never caught on.
In recent years, cars have appeared in “satin” finishes.
These seemed like an attempt to wean the public off the idea of a shiny new car, but if the paint was of poor quality it turned out to be more maintenance-intensive than traditional high-gloss paints.
BMW seems to be hoping that its anodized finish could be the answer.
Anodizing is one way of electrically increasing the natural oxidation layer on materials like aluminum.
It is already widely used in the automotive industry to protect components under the hood and to form a base layer onto which paint is sprayed.
