Remove sanding swirls from headlights

[Phresh1]

I bought a 3m headlight restoration kit awhile back and tried it on one of my headlights last weekend. Needless to say, I'm not satisfied by the result and probably should have went with the Meguiar's kit. I was working on the headlight close to 2 hours using the steps provided in the instructions and watched a few videos on it as well. When I got to the final sanding with the Trizac 3000 grit wet sandpaper I initially thought everything was going well and I finished with the polish provided, on closer inspection with the headlights on the lens was covered in swirls marks. I decided to purchase additional 3000 grit Trizac pads and sanded it out again, nearing 10+ passes with medium to light pressure. Unfortunately there was not much improvements. I have a Meguiars DA with M105 and M205 along with Plastix and am curious if I polish it out with the 105 then follow up with 205 if that would be enough to removed these light, swirl like marks in the lens or will I have to wet sand further with something like 2000 grit?

[HCAD]

Re: Remove sanding swirls from headlights

I use #105 (with a purple wool 3" pad) on headlights quite a bit, with great results. You should surely try that first before wet sanding again. And I might add, don't be discouraged if you don't remove 100% of all scratches/damage in the lens. Where some might be internal, others might be too deep to justify removing. If you have a clear lens from polishing with #105 and your headlight is not affected by a minor scratch, I'd say leave well enough alone. It's a headlight, it's going to get scratched and damaged again. You'll likely have to polish it again in a year or so. Don't wear off more of the plastic covering than you have to.

[P-Shooter]

Re: Remove sanding swirls from headlights

Try using a wool pad with PlastX. I've had better success with removing #2000 grit sanding marks (yellow pad came with the Meguiar's heavy duty kit I borrowed from a friend) compared to thick foam pad. I also used a corded 1/2" drill even though I have a Griot's 3" mini polisher. I'll try the hook and loop wool pad with the Griot's if I ever get around to buying one.