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Headlight clearing?


Silvrav

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HI Guys

 

 

So I was planning to go the wetsand route (600,800,2000) then clearcoat it and wax it.

 

 

Now i saw this video :

 

 

Did anyone try it? comments? what would last longer and be better for the headlights?

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Clearing it up is the easy part (sand/rub/etc), keeping it clear is the harder one. UV protection layer is important.

I'm lazy so I used this Philips kit, works surprisingly well (final layer is the important one). Australian sun is harsh, previous Turtle Wax kit didn't last.

 

https://www.powerbulbs.com/us/product/philips-headlight-restoration-kit

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  • 3 weeks later...

I agree the sealing/keeping it clear is the harder part.

 

But I really wanted to try this out. I did it yesterday and very impressed and pleased with the results.

 

Extremely easy and quick as you can see in the video. Ran out of mothers as I use it for other parts of another car so bought a new one. Didn't have a polisher so I used a drill with a pad attachment.

 

Note, a battery powered polisher likely won't work, I tried.

 

Bought the polisher pad from princess auto (somewhat the Canadian equivalent to harbour freight).

 

My lights were just slightly hazed, no yellowing. So keep in mind that this will likely only work on hazed lights. Which is the exact example he used this technique on.

 

Mine also have a decent amount of pitting which of course this will do little to nothing to help that.

 

I was actually surprised how much it improved how much light and the direction the light shined. I have a HID retrofit so I my case it improved the cut off. The OEM high beam was also improved, I had a bit too much foreground light coming from them until lens got cleared. Much less foreground light which means more light going down the road where it should.

 

An easy indicator I found to see how much improvement or how bad the hazing is. With the lights on (likely more noticeable in the dark) look from the sides and top and see how much the lens is being lit up by lights. Before cleaning mine the light would actually light up the lens itself. After clearing the light was going through the lens and therefore the lens wasn't absorbing the light.

 

I would venture to guess this polish is mild enough that it might not hurt the uv protection built into the oem head light lens.

 

Likely unnecessary and may had little effect but I did use a plastic polish after just to buff up the plastic a bit more to make it shine/clear. And work out the microscopic scratches of the mother's. I think it did exact that and they looked a bit better after a bit of that polish.

 

And just because I had it around. Used to head light plastic sealant. Which I think helped slightly with the pitting.

 

Last thing I want to do is add a film. I've seen what film can do to fill in scratches on phone's/watches, it pretty amazing. So I would expect the film to fill in the pits and improve the lights even more while protecting them. There was a Russian on YouTube that got surprised that film improved the light output (he measured).

 

 

But even without the film, extremely happy with the results. DO IT!

 

Cost is low and effort is really low. With basically zero risk.

 

I do have some before and after. Which shows a decent comparison. Unfortunately didn't get a picture before and after of the lights on a wall or how much the light lit of the lens but both are hard to capture on camera anyway.

 

Regardless there shouldn't be a need to convince anyone to do this. Instant headlight improvement. Thanks to Silvrav for posting this! I actually had bought the sandpaper and 2k clear and was already to rip the headlights out, sand and clear cost them. This was a much better decision!

 

 

(typed on my phone will correct spelling and general crappy wording later)

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