Revitalising car headlight lens
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- Опубліковано 2 жов 2024
- In this video I use Brasso, a mildly abrasive metal polish, to rejuvenate the surface of a 12-year-old headlight lens. The plastic of the old lens was covered in micro scratches and surface degradation.
The Brasso did a wonderful job of removing the degradation and I’m sure it will make a significant difference to how much light reaches the road. If I had thought about it I would have just done one headlight and tested it at night, is it is, I made the video and then immediately polished the other lens. They both like new now.
Thanks for watching.
Kind Regards . . . Andy
Good to see you Andy. I hope life is treating you well.
Best Wishes, Brendan.
Thank you! You can tape off the surrounding painted surface and overcoat the lens with easy to find U/V clear-coat spray. Commonly found as mag-wheel clear-coat.
Brasso works, or you can use Silvo polish as well, basically the same product. Just hit the finished surface with some car paste wax after doing this, to provide protection for the plastic you have now exposed again.
I did this on our 20 year old Yaris using wet and dry followed by T-cut, which is identical to Brasso as far as I can tell. Worked a charm.
Andy, first of all, good to hear you; I will ask my son to try this out on his 40 year old Mercedes, 73’s Bob
So nice to hear your method of fixing the headlights. I have been using brasso Andy since I was seven years old. I guess that kind of dates me as being up there in age. The issue with lenses is the coating on the lenses is what gets eaten by the chemicals in the air. Imagine that we breathe that garbage. My lens had to be changed since the plastic material developed stratton lines throughout the material itself. That kind of kills the game of palishing. Nice video and peace to you fella too.
Andy, could you be able to tell me more about induction heating ??? Please let me know the best way to touch base. Good day too. vf
good idea
Good to see you on UA-cam again Andy.
I will try to polish the headlights on my Renault Trafic van before the MOT in December.
I hope you are well. 73's to you and yours. .. Ian.
Hi Ian, thanks for the the comment. It was only the night after I'd finished the video that I realised just how much of a difference removing the surface degradation made to the light beams profile. I now get a well defined light pattern on the road as apposed to the very blurry and dim shape it was before. Good luck with the MOT.
73's . . . Andy
I was just thinking of using silver polish on mine. I want to add UV protection afterwards. You can buy UV filtering clear coat, but that seems quite expensive. But I have also seen WD40 used - it just fills the cracks that cause the fogging. I'm now wondering if kid's waterproof high factor sun tan lotion would de-fog, and offer future UV protection in one step?
Hi many yeas ago I was using some Perspex type material as high voltage insulators, I drilled and tapped the Perspex and to lubricate the tapping I squirted WD-40 into the thread, the whole insulator, about the shape and size of a cotton reel cracked just like the old style window screens used to when they broke. So, I've always been a bit nervous about WD-40 on clear hard plastic. The Perspex was ok with mineral oil and soap as a lubricant but I never did get to the bottom of the WD-40 cracking issue.
Good luck, let me know if you find anything about WD-40 cracking clear plastics.
All the very best and Happy New year . . . Andy
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@@AndyDaviesByTheSea I wonder if WD40 contains some acetone? I've glued transparent perspex in the past by just wetting the joint with acetone, and it melts the surface just enough to glue the pieces together. The problem is, if you look closely there are lots of micro cracks where the acetone has been. I speculate that the surface of the perspex swells and stresses the underlying perspex.
Happy New year! ... John