Product review - 3M headlight restorer kit

[K5dreamer]

Hey all, its not the blazer, but it involved wrench spinning, and i know most of us have vehicles other than the K5's in our lives sooooooooo i thought id share.

My other car is a 2000 Jetta TDI. It has the famous yellowing, sandblasted, ugly headlights. Ive been toying with buying new ones, getting aftermarket projector headlamps, or something else. But those are normally hundreds upon hundreds of dollars to fix.

Instead, the last time i was at the VW parts department my guy fred suggestd the 3M Headlight restorer kit, he had started carrying it for people with my problem. so i figure what the hell, its $17 bucks, lets see if it works. Ive used headlight "cleaning" kits before, that were mail order, using sandpaper, and were piss poor performers. but this was name brand, so i figured id give it a shot.

A picture is worth a thousand words so......

Before using the kit (sitting unsanded, as they were removed from the car)

AAAAnnd after.... keep in mind, these are the same headlights, not new units.

This took a bit of time, i did 5-7 passes with the 500 grit, 3-4 passes with the 800 grit, 2-3 passes with the 3000 grit foam sanding pad, and 2 passes with the foam polishing pad, then wiped the lens clean with an old t-shirt.

very much worth the $17 i spent on it. just for more fun pics......

 

[blazinzuk]

Very nice. convenient too. I guess my malibus headlights will be getting the treatment soon!

 

[70jimmy]

good info! Thanks

 

[Avery4jc]

WOW, that's well worth the time and $17...

 

[dhcomp]

For those of you with lights that aren't as bad, try Meguires Plastix , its a plastic polish. I used it on a mothers powerball polisher, but i bet any powered polisher would work.

I restore my parking lenses on the burb every few months, takes about 10 min. Works awesome.

 

[K5dreamer]

one thing to keep in mind, you need to have a little faith.... each pass with the sanding disks makes the lens look WORSE. By the time you finish the last pass with the 800 grit, when you let the lens dry, it will be almost totally frosted white. That means you did it right. the first pass with the 3000 grit foam sanding pad will clear it up dramatically. even after the polishing pad, the true crystal clear results arent apparent until you wipe the lens clean with the old t-shirt.

A little tip, i let the lenses dry between passes, the wet lens hides the imperfections, letting it dry shows where you need to put more work in.

think of it like painting, the results depend on your prep work, so i spent about an hour, hour and a half on the lights to get em to look that way.

 

[Babaganoosh]

I was thinking about buying this product but thats as far as it went. Now I'm going to have to give it a try on my step moms avalanche.


Here is a instructional video for a hearing and visual on how the proses works.

 

[K5dreamer]

nice ad with the vid

i took mine out of the car to avoid any screwups, needless to say, with the "like new" lenses, and the fact that i upgraded to the next brightest sylvania headlights (from 9001 to 9007) driving at night is an entirely new experience for the better .

 

[lectric80]

This has me wondering if it would work on our tail lights. New lenses are pricey, but I have a spare set I could test it out on. Guess I will try to do that this winter and post up the results. It may not be as obvious on a colored lens, but they certainly do look better new than they do after years of being on our trucks.

 

[Blue85]

Anybody who knows how to polish stuff can restore headlights. I have done it with wetsanding and rubbing compound, then finish it off with a fine metal polish. Works great. I've also resealed them with this extra runny kind of silicone from a parts store. First you pull the bulbs and then bake them in the oven at like 150 degrees for a while to drive all of the moisture out. Then hit the seam with the silicone and put the bulbs back in.

I've also polished up the tailights on the K5. Works great, just like with the headlights. It's just harder because of the trim and the raised features on it.

 

[Hubnut]

My two cents: I did this to my wife's Honda. Don't know the kit manufacturer. Looked perfectly new like yours shown. Less than one year later, they are back to yellow again. Good investment just before you try to sell it in my opinion.

 

[gone huntin]

We use a kit at work that's made by MOC. It has a type of fluid that you use with different grades of sandpaper that cleans as it sands them. After you get through sanding and cleaning them you reseal them with a sealer that comes with the kit. I used it on my '91 F250 about a year ago and they still look like new. The headlights have a protective coating on them new, if you sand that off and don't reseal them they won't stay clear very long. I would try to find something to seal them with now that you've got them looking new again.
http://www.mocproducts.com/mm/e_hl.htm

 

[buefchris]

Glad to see these videos on this,been wanting to try it.

 

[moneypit_K5]

good show with this stuff man, Weve got an 01 jetta with one of the lenses so bad it barely emits light.