Headlight Restoration Review
10-30-2011, 10:51 PM
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Headlight Restoration Review I picked up an 02 SOM Z28 a few weeks ago. Car was in fantastic shape, hadn't broken 30,000 miles yet. It just needed some TLC because it hadn't been detailed for a few years by the previous owner. So I brought the car back home and changed all the fluids, filters, plugs, brakes, and tires (brakes and tires were needed, rest was basically for my own comfort knowing they were fresh), then had the car detailed.
At this point, the car was pretty much brand new, so this made the faded headlights stand out like a sore thumb.
(I didn't have a good before picture, but this is pretty much the same condition my headlights were in)
Wanting to do something about them, but not having a big detailing knowledge, I stopped by my local autozone and took a look at what they had. I ended up getting a bottle of Meguiar's Plastix Polish to try out since I didn't know how much work my headlights really needed. I used the polish with some terry towels and rubbed it in for a while, and it helped take out some of the yellow haze, but didn't really do a whole lot for the scratches and oxidation.
Since the Meg polish alone was a bust, I started looking into some more products. I started to see a lot of people who had positive experiences with 3M's headlight restoration kit, so I decided to try that next. I went back to autozone today and picked it up (on sale for $16.99), and came home to start working.
The kit calls for dry sanding with 500 grit abrasive pads (provided) to remove the scratches and oxidation on the lens. This was followed up by more dry sanding with 800 grit pads (provided) to smooth out the 500 grit scratches. The 3rd step was to do some wet sanding with a 3000 grit pad (provided). This removed the scratches from the 500 and 800, and smoothed the lens out. The last step was to apply the provided polish and buff it onto the lens to restore the clarity. All of the steps use a normal household drill as a buffer (an adapter for the pads comes with the kit).
The kit did help remove the haze, but it still left the lens cloudy. I'm thinking it might have been a problem using too little pressure when sanding, but either way I wasn't as impressed as I thought I'd be.
This is when I got a little more resourceful (really didn't want to buy anymore restoration stuff). I still had half a bottle of the Meg's polish left, and since it helped before, I decided to use the 3M polish buffer pad with the Meg's polish. This combination, and some Blue Magic sealer ended up giving me the clarity I was looking for.
Overall, it was a learning experience for me with headlight restoration. I didn't spend a ton of money to do it (<$40, local car wash/detailer wanted $50 for restorations). For anyone else who might look at the 3M kit for faded headlights, my advice would be to look a little more, since there's definitely some other options out there, and I'm sure some are better (we've got the ask a detailer thread on ls1tech now). Made for a good use of a Sunday anyways
At this point, the car was pretty much brand new, so this made the faded headlights stand out like a sore thumb.
(I didn't have a good before picture, but this is pretty much the same condition my headlights were in)
Wanting to do something about them, but not having a big detailing knowledge, I stopped by my local autozone and took a look at what they had. I ended up getting a bottle of Meguiar's Plastix Polish to try out since I didn't know how much work my headlights really needed. I used the polish with some terry towels and rubbed it in for a while, and it helped take out some of the yellow haze, but didn't really do a whole lot for the scratches and oxidation.
Since the Meg polish alone was a bust, I started looking into some more products. I started to see a lot of people who had positive experiences with 3M's headlight restoration kit, so I decided to try that next. I went back to autozone today and picked it up (on sale for $16.99), and came home to start working.
The kit calls for dry sanding with 500 grit abrasive pads (provided) to remove the scratches and oxidation on the lens. This was followed up by more dry sanding with 800 grit pads (provided) to smooth out the 500 grit scratches. The 3rd step was to do some wet sanding with a 3000 grit pad (provided). This removed the scratches from the 500 and 800, and smoothed the lens out. The last step was to apply the provided polish and buff it onto the lens to restore the clarity. All of the steps use a normal household drill as a buffer (an adapter for the pads comes with the kit).
The kit did help remove the haze, but it still left the lens cloudy. I'm thinking it might have been a problem using too little pressure when sanding, but either way I wasn't as impressed as I thought I'd be.
This is when I got a little more resourceful (really didn't want to buy anymore restoration stuff). I still had half a bottle of the Meg's polish left, and since it helped before, I decided to use the 3M polish buffer pad with the Meg's polish. This combination, and some Blue Magic sealer ended up giving me the clarity I was looking for.
Overall, it was a learning experience for me with headlight restoration. I didn't spend a ton of money to do it (<$40, local car wash/detailer wanted $50 for restorations). For anyone else who might look at the 3M kit for faded headlights, my advice would be to look a little more, since there's definitely some other options out there, and I'm sure some are better (we've got the ask a detailer thread on ls1tech now). Made for a good use of a Sunday anyways
11-01-2011, 01:01 AM
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Looks good and better. I tried the kits before but after about a month or two, they started to turn back with the yellow/hazey look so ended up, I went out and bought the stuff myself and pieced together my own "kit" and instead of polishing them out, I took clear coat and sprayed the lenses with gloss clear coat and for maintaing them, I'll just throw a little wax on the lights as if I was waxing the car and they have been fine ever since.
