Finish options explained
Colour Coded Van Door Shields
Jeff Scott explains why not all shields are alike and demonstrates the brushed stainless, matte black and colour-matched paint finishes available.
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It's your van and your choice how you want your shields to look
Sussex Installations offers external van door shields in different finishes to suit different customers. We offer brushed marine-grade stainless steel, matte black powder-coated or painted to the most popular variant colour code of your van.
At Sussex Installations we have led the way for years now in terms of stylish designed external van door shields, designing the shields to look as one with your van, to be a perfect fit on the door, designing the shields with the installer in mind so that the studs are in places that are easy for the installer to get a spanner onto them when fitting, making the installation instructions really clear and easy to follow (which makes the installation as easy as possible), manufacturing all of our shields here in our factory in Eastbourne (UK) to the highest quality and now we are proudly offering a colour coding service where we will paint the shields to the colour code of your van!
Some tradesmen want a visible shield on the van and like the look of our quality marine grade stainless steel in brushed finish, some like our matte black powder coated shields and this can sometimes depend on the colour of their van. For some customers we have found that it's really important for them to have their shields to be painted to the colour of their vehicle. In the past they had to purchase shields from us and then taken them to a bodyshop to have them painted at a considerable extra cost before having them fitted. A problem with a one off bodyshop painting shields is that they are often unlike anything that a car body paint shop has painted before, as the shields have a 90 degree corner on them and that can be a surprisingly big challenge to overcome and a significant learning curve in order to achieve a high quality finish until a suitable streamlined paint process and specially adapted spray booth structure is implemented.
For security purposes we always recommend our Stealth shields that go covertly inside of your door as your 1st (and most important) line of defence.
For security purposes we always recommend our Stealth shields that go covertly inside of your door as your 1st (and most important) line of defence, but some customers really want a shield that goes onto the outside of the van that is visible. We also have many vans now that have been broken into already and our external shields are a great cost effective way of repairing the damage with minimal downtime for the van and avoiding costly insurance claims. For some model vans we may have medium, large and even extra large size shields to cover larger areas of damage or to cover damage caused by thieves cutting around a previously fitted external shield.
These extracts are from genuine five-star Google reviews.
★★★★★"They even colour coded our external lock shield, which was a really nice touch to finish off an excellent job."
Justin Davies · Google review, 2025
★★★★★"I fitted five locks and three plates, all pretty straightforward. I colour coded door plates to be a bit more subtle."
stephen coles · Google review, 2025
★★★★★"Plates already painted matte black. The van looks great and safe."
Marcelo Rossi · Google review, June 2020
Review wording has been lightly shortened for display without changing its meaning. Full reviews remain available on the Sussex Installations Google Business Profile.
Brushed marine grade stainless steel, matte black powder-coating, or painted to the most popular variant colour code of your van, all manufactured at our factory in Eastbourne, UK.
Customers previously had to buy shields from us and then take them to a bodyshop to be painted at considerable extra cost. Because the shields have a 90 degree corner, they are often unlike anything a car body paint shop has painted before, so we developed our own streamlined paint process and specially adapted spray booth to achieve a high quality finish.
We always recommend our Stealth shields, which go covertly inside the door, as your first and most important line of defence. External shields suit customers who want a visible deterrent, and they are also a cost-effective way to repair a van that has already been broken into, avoiding a costly insurance claim, with medium, large and extra large sizes available for bigger areas of damage.
Jeff Scott explains why not all shields are alike and demonstrates the brushed stainless, matte black and colour-matched paint finishes available.
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Jeff Scott explains how to properly install an external security shield on a Ford Custom van door, covering masking, drilling, rust protection and secure fitting.
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