3 Minute Headlight Restoration

no one likes cloudy headlights but how do you go from this cloudy messed up headlight to this without spending hours of labor and lots of money this is how I do this in three minutes for about 50 cents in materials this is how I do this in real time what materials do I use paper towels now shop towels work better but you can use any towels you want window cleaner also known as blue juice this is to clean the headlights you got to get the bugs you got to get the wrong grime and any other stuff that got on the headlights you have to get that off so that it doesn't interfere now this can be skipped if the headlight is already clean let's say you've already gone through a car wash or something like that then you don't have to sit there and scrub this as much make sure you get all the junk off so there's no debris sticking to the headlight once that is clean next I use steel wool this is for OTT steel wool this is to clean off loose plastic and other debris that may have stuck to the headlight the fog here the headlight is the better that this works just get it all cleaned off if there is a coating on the plastic it has to be removed otherwise the whole process won't work stay tuned to the rest of this video to see how that is done after cleaning it with steel wool again wash it using the blue window cleaner and a paper towel you want to remove all debris from it it wants to be perfectly clean nothing left on the surface of the part next I will get another paper towel this one I will carefully fold so as to have a piece that is about half the size of the headlight itself I apply acetone liberally to this paper towel it is saturated with it it had it drips as a matter of fact and I apply one pass across it then another pass we're done next just to make sure that no acetone got on the paint and may cause up the paint any problems spray it with a window cleaner and just wipe it off this is how I can restore a headlight in about three minutes and now for the sciency part about why the headlights look so bad in the first place why this process works so fast how long should this restoration last first of all why do my headlights look so bad this is because the headlights are made out of a material called polycarbonate polycarbonate is susceptible to UV light it degrades in it where is the best source of UV light it's the Sun so if a car is left outside over a period of five or six years you can see how that could happen car manufacturers put a coating on the headlight to prevent the UV light from affecting the plastic however this coating is only intended to last so long after that it degrades as well and so that's why you get this appearance of fog on the headlight not only has the coating degraded but also some of the polycarbonate has to degrade it as well that coating has to come off so that the polycarbonate can be restored to its original clears condition in order to take that coating off you must sand it off now you can use 500 grit sandpaper you can use even finer sandpaper if you want it depends on how tough that coding is the more degraded the coding is the easier it is to take it off once you're through that coding now you can start the process with the steel wool on the polycarbonate what is this process work so fast this is because the acetone is literally melting the surface of the polycarbonate headlight once that melts it flows out into a smooth surface and now has clarity again how long should this restoration last it depends on the environment that it's put into if it is left outside all the time in direct sunlight it will last anywhere from six months to a year before the polycarbonate starts to degrade again and then you just go ahead and do the process once more if you garage the car if you keep it out of the Sun then it will last much much longer if you wish the restoration to last longer than one year or a little bit longer you must put a coating on the headlight itself there are many coatings out there available clear paint works well but it will degrade as well I personally prefer to leave it as it is then once a year do the wipe I'm done just that easy hi thanks for watching our Channel please if you have any suggestions for anybody you'd like us to do especially maybe RV repair or some type of dog grooming please leave them in the comments below

Channel: How We Do It

Views: 2,373,554

Rating: 4.7252903 out of 5

Keywords: #headlight, #restore, #restoration, #cleaning, headlight restoration, repair, windex, acetone, headlight restore, how to clean headlights, how to restore headlights, foggy headlights, how to, hazy headlights, cleaning headlights, pass headlight inspections, failed safety inspection

Id: z2ZRKPshPVM

Length: 6min 21sec (381 seconds)

Published: Tue Jun 21 2016