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Front of my hood was all torn up from bugs and rock chips and crap like that. Installed an AVS low profile bug shield. Didn't expect to love it as much as I do. It's not so much for bugs on the windshield but the hood wear is dramatically reduced
If you do a substantial amount of highway driving they do serve a purpose protecting the leading edge of the hood from chips but beyond that they don't do much.
I've got an AVS smoked bug shield on mine. I didn't want to deal with the rock chips on the front you would get otherwise. PPF strip on the leading edge would be a good option if you didn't want a shield of some sort.
More than anything it is for protecting the leading edge of the hood, to some there is an aesthetic element as well. I have an OEM Ford unit that stands off the hood about 3/8", smoked plexiglass and I like it okay, does the job but I prefer the flush fitting one on my wife's Edge ST; I plan on getting a similar one for my truck and installing at some point in the future.
I understand it protects the edge. But I never had one on my 2008 f150 for 14 years and never had any bad chip issues on the hood edge.
They’re a lot of other unprotected parts of front. The bumpers if painted will take a real beating.
Depends where you're driving. On my last truck, my painted front bumper and the front edge of the hood were all chewed up after 8 years. With a chrome bumper and bug guard on the current truck, I have 0 chips.
How closely you follow the vehicle in front of you, and at what speed, determines where or if road debris will strike your vehicle.
Not all bug deflectors are bug deflectors... The ones that sit flush with the body are nose guards, no matter what the mfg calls them. Bug deflectors need to angle up away from the hood at their trailing edge to create a high pressure 'hump' as the air flows across the hood. This change a bug's angle of travel so they hit the windshield at a shallow enough angle that they don't split open. An effective bug shield will decrease your fuel mileage by 3-5%. Most of the deflectors I looked at last year won't deflect anything away from the windshield.
