Self Experiment: Headlight Restoration - Before and after.

[djdownfawl]

Hello.
My civic's headlight were oxidized and scratched heavily and i tried almost everything i could find locally.
I had #83 laying around and i thought to give it a shot.
But before that. I took a #0000 steel wool and Turtle wax Polishing compound & scratch remover and rubbed it on my headlights.
That scratched the surface heavily. So then i did 3 passes of #83 w/ 8006 pad and then 1 pass of plastx on both with 8006 pad and then 1 pass of plastx w/ 9006 pad on both headlights.
After all that the headlights came out to be like this:

BEFORE:









AFTER:









Now the headlights still have these hairline scratches that i cannot get rid of, which i think the steel wool left behind.
How can i get these out?
Do i have to buy a rotary buffer? Which rotary buffer should i buy?
I am thinking of getting the Headlight Restoration kit #2 from ADT because it has the wool pad and #85.
But i am not sure.
Please help me out here.
Thank you

[Mike Phillips]

Re: Self Experiment: Headlight Restoration - Before and after.

Just a friendly tip on sharing photos on discussion forums.

I have a 21" monitor with the resolution set to 1280 x 1024 and I find I'm having to horizontal scroll in order to see all of the shot in some of the pictures you've posted.

A good rule of thumb is to resize your photos to around 700 pixels wide, maybe 800 pixels wide if your really want to show a large photo. By doing this, the majority of the people in the world will be able to see the entire picture without having to horizontal scroll.

Anytime someone has to horizontal scroll to see an entire picture they can't really see the entire picture because as they scroll to one side on their monitor to see what's not on the screen, a portion of the picture on the opposite side of the screen is disappearing off the monitor. Therefor they can never really see the entire photo which kind of takes away from the value of the photo and usually the goal of the poster, (to show a photo, not a portion of a photo)

Just a friendly tip...


This is 700 pixels wide



This is 800 pixels wide



Both photos were resized from the original using a free software program called Easy Thumbnails which really works great to resize photos without distorting them.

Here's a short how-to article on how to use this software to insure great results starting the first time you use it.

How to resize your photos before uploading

This will help you on any forum you post to.

[Mike Phillips]

Re: Self Experiment: Headlight Restoration - Before and after.

Also just to note,

Somehow when you copied and pasted your images from Imageshack to our forum it included reciprocal links back to Imageshack. We don't know if Imageshack does this on purpose, but this is the 3rd time we've removed these links from members posts on our forums this week.

If possible, only share your images, not links back to photo hosting websites.

Thanks!

[Mike Phillips]

Re: Self Experiment: Headlight Restoration - Before and after.

In order to remove the deeper scratches you'll have to level th surface of the plastic, this will probably have to be done with wet-sanding, or learn to live with them.

This explains everything,

What it means to remove a scratch out of anything...

[djdownfawl]

Re: Self Experiment: Headlight Restoration - Before and after.

Sorry Mike, i will do that from next time.
And i think the links are being included automatically from imageshack. I only shared the pics.
Could you also give me some recommendations on the post i made?
Thank you

[Mike Phillips]

Re: Self Experiment: Headlight Restoration - Before and after.

Hello.

I had #83 laying around and i thought to give it a shot. But before that. I took a #0000 steel wool and Turtle wax Polishing compound & scratch remover and rubbed it on my headlights.

That scratched the surface heavily.

So then i did 3 passes of #83 w/ 8006 pad and then 1 pass of PlastX on both with 8006 pad and then 1 pass of PlastX w/ 9006 pad on both headlights.


Now the headlights still have these hairline scratches that i cannot get rid of, which i think the steel wool left behind.

How can i get these out?

In the link I included on how to get a scratch out of anything it basically tells you that in order to remove a scratch you have to remove all the material surrounding the scratch until the highest part of the surface is level with the lowest parts of the defects you're trying to remove, in simple words you need to somehow abrade the surface flat and the restore gloss and clarity.

Probably the most effective way to do this will be to wet-sand the plastic till all the scratches are removed and then use a rotary buffer with a compound on a wool pad to remove your sanding marks.

Because the plastic used for most plastic headlights is relatively soft and easy to work on, you could also sand the deeper scratches out of the headlights and then remove your sanding marks by hand using M105 and a piece of terry cloth.

Chances are good you could also use the kit at ADS but I don't know for sure, it will depend upon how aggressive the product for removing scratches is.

Does one of the above options sound like something you can tackle?

[Mike Phillips]

Re: Self Experiment: Headlight Restoration - Before and after.

For other's sake, in the future try to post a picture about this big

This is 800 Pixels Wide



Otherwise no one can really see the picture as portions are always scrolling off screen as people scroll to the opposite side to see what they can't see?

Make sense?

Large pictures don't help you... they hurt you.... here's a free software program called Easy Thumbnails which really works great to resize photos without distorting them.

Here's a short how-to article on how to use this software to insure great results starting the first time you use it.

How to resize your photos before uploading

[djdownfawl]

Re: Self Experiment: Headlight Restoration - Before and after.

Yeah i think that makes sense.
How are all the polishes/cleaners, compounds listed according to their cutting strength?

[Markus Kleis]

Re: Self Experiment: Headlight Restoration - Before and after.

Yeah i think that makes sense.
How are all the polishes/cleaners, compounds listed according to their cutting strength?

If you look at the Mirror Glaze line the bottles have a cut indicator on a 1-12 scale on the side of the bottle.

It's fairly hard to really say across Meguiar's line-up exactly how everything matches up, as many products utilize very different technologies and thus can't be easily slotted into any one place (Ie diminishing abrasives, non-diminishing, micro abrasives, etc).

Hope that helps some.

If you have a question about cut on a particular couple products feel free to post them up and I'm sure someone can chime in with experience on the products.

[Mike Phillips]

Re: Self Experiment: Headlight Restoration - Before and after.

Yeah i think that makes sense.
How are all the polishes/cleaners, compounds listed according to their cutting strength?

In our professional line there is a scale on the bottle.

You need to

1. Learn to live with the deeper scratches.
2. Sand the plastic flat and remove your sanding marks.

It's one or the other, and if you're going to sand the plastic flat then you're going to need an aggressive compound, that's why I listed M105 with a rotary buffer, this product and this tool with a wool pad will work for sure.

You can try with a less aggressive product and it may work it will just take longer.

It's all about removing material. (as explained in the first link I posted in this thread)

This explains it all...

What it means to remove a scratch out of anything...


At the same time you only have so much plastic to work with so somewhere you have to draw a line.

What's a new headlight cost? In most cases fixing what you have as best as you can is a better option than buying a new headlight.

[djdownfawl]

Re: Self Experiment: Headlight Restoration - Before and after.

New headlights are like $278 each

[djdownfawl]

Re: Self Experiment: Headlight Restoration - Before and after.

What sanding papers do i need?
Should i get Makita rotary? and what wool pad?
what other pads?

[Mike Phillips]

Re: Self Experiment: Headlight Restoration - Before and after.

New headlights are like $278 each

Didn't know the price but figured somewhere around that and the point of the question is to point out that at this point you don't have much to lose if you make a mistake. Good news is that the plastic is in most case plenty thick so going to far isn't a problem like working on car paint.

Also, for just a portion of what new headlights cost you can buy an entry level rotary buffer and all the products you'll need,

Sandpaper
Wool Buffing Pad
Rotary Buffer
M105

Or do it by hand,

Sandpaper
M105
Piece of terry cloth - free, just cut up a towel


You can try your PC and to some level it may work, it will restore clarity to the surface but it probably won't remove 'all' the sanding marks.

[djdownfawl]

Re: Self Experiment: Headlight Restoration - Before and after.

Didn't know the price but figured somewhere around that and the point of the question is to point out that at this point you don't have much to lose if you make a mistake. Good news is that the plastic is in most case plenty thick so going to far isn't a problem like working on car paint.

Also, for just a portion of what new headlights cost you can buy an entry level rotary buffer and all the products you'll need,

Sandpaper
Wool Buffing Pad
Rotary Buffer
M105

Or do it by hand,

Sandpaper
M105
Piece of terry cloth - free, just cut up a towel


You can try your PC and to some level it may work, it will restore clarity to the surface but it probably won't remove 'all' the sanding marks.

I do have your DA polisher.
I was now thinking of buying a good rotary buffer. I have seen many videos and noticed that people are using Makita rotary buffers. The video i was just watching your Wetsanding part 1 -5 .. you use Dewalt.
Please advise me which one to get.

So for now my list includes.
M105
W5000 wool pad?
Sanding papers - I don't know what grits do i need?

For wet sanding what solution do i use to spray the surface will rubbing?

What all else do i need?

[djdownfawl]

Re: Self Experiment: Headlight Restoration - Before and after.

Oh and also these are the things i already have-
M07
M26
M34
M80
M83
M66
FINAL INSPECTION
MEG DA POLISHER
3 8006 PADS
3 9006 PADS
--- And all the Consumer line products.