DIY: Polishing Your Foggy Plastic Headlights

[qfarmer89]

I've done this process on a BMW e39 540i to bring out the lights several times, but they look good for about a week or two and after it rains they fog right back up. What am I doing wrong?

[4DIYers]

@qfarmer89 You may not have them finely polished enough. So overtime when the water washes off the wax, the rough surface will show again.

[keiths314]

I'm amazed this works so well... I would have thought sanding the lights would ruin them.

[justpossibly]

thanks!



[yTubeBlowsBigBalls]

How does toothpaste compare to the expensive plastic polishing compounds?

[4DIYers]

@yTubeBlowsBigBalls It has a very very fine abrasive in toothpaste.

[roccotool]

Use toothpaste. It has silica, which is the same thing used in polish. Don't beleive me? Search it on here or google it. Save yourself a bunch of money.

[4DIYers]

@roccotool Yes, toothpaste does work. I personally haven't used it on headlights, but I've used it before for polishing aluminum.

[yTubeBlowsBigBalls]

@4DIYers I've also used it as the 2nd last step to polishing aluminum, it doesn't give it a mirror finish until you use a dedicated aluminum polish.

[PAYBACK118]

Thats bloody impressive thanks for sharing.

[FalkenZ08]

i have some rubbing compound and polishing compound. my headlights is not as bad as yours but what do you think i the best way to make it look brand new?? should i just go straight with the rubbing compound? and then wax?

[4DIYers]

@FalkenZ08 Possible you can go straight to the rubbing compound. It may take a little longer to achieve the clearness, but it is doable. If it doesn't work as quickly as you would like it to, then you can skip straight to the 2000 grit sand paper and then compound and wax.

[FalkenZ08]

@4DIYers i got a free time yesterday and did it. it did came out clean and clear by just using a rubbing compound and polishing compound which took me around 4-5 minutes on each one! but hell its was freaking worthet and i used a teflon wax from dupont it worked fine

[MrBoy219]

If Automakers say its dangerous to drive with foggy headlights.. Why in the hell did they make them

[darren7779]

great vid mate gonna try it today on my bmw e39 thanks

[quatroportte]

@darren7779

how did it turn out? i just bouth a e39 yesterday and i need to do this.

[treblarefils]

i have a gti also and plast x is not harsh enough if you have badly damaged healights like this or the housings on my car... Plast x is a great product tho and would work excelent in the final buffing phase after the 2000 grit.

[Mastamule]

Does it matter the kind of sand paper you use? I went in with the soap and water to clean the headlight, which it helped a lot, but then went in with the sand paper on the rough spots and it seems to have made things worse. I went in with polish afterwards thinking it might help to no avail. What do you think went wrong?

[4DIYers]

@Mastamule What kind of grit sand paper did you use? I normally use a wet/dry sand paper which doesn't dissolve in water. The grit I started with was 1000, then to 1500, then to finish off with 2000 before polishing. If you use a heavier grit, the light will appear more hazy, until you move up to a higher grit.

[LIttleNemoNES]

wow! Great tutorial, tnx

[FarmuhGameplay]

I have black spray tint on my tailights from the previous owner, would this process work too for the taillights? Thanks

[4DIYers]

@FarmuhGameplay Are you looking to polish or remove the tinted coating???

[mattd28]

Wow, one hell of a job dude, what a transformation, I would of thought new headlights needed how wrong I was.

[4DIYers]

@mattd28 Thank you for the comment!

[armani9300]

Nice ,but fix your car Hood man before it get more rust ,

Also Plastix works great on this light.

[4DIYers]

@armani9300 Thank you... Actually the car is getting the hood replaced under VW warranty on the 20th, so there will be no more stone chips.

[armani9300]

@4DIYers Great to know that ,also should try plastix from meguiars.

I have tried it & it works great .

[clairefbonilla]

Thank you so much. What is your opinion of using clear coat instead of wax?

[4DIYers]

@clairefbonilla Glad to help out, thank you for the comment! I haven't experimented with using clear coat on the headlights. I have used it on taillights before after spraying them with the nightshade tint. The clear coat would provide a hard surface. The only issue is that you would have to wet sand and polish the clear coat after to achieve a glass finish because it will have a certain amount of orange peal.

[khori20]

Great job! It helped me a lot

[4DIYers]

@khori20 Glad I was able to help, thank you!

[bitemyram]

Frog's awesome Bro !

[4DIYers]

@bitemyram Thank you!

[TraitorJackKnives]

Great job and video, would love to view more.

[4DIYers]

@TraitorJackKnives Thank you! I will definitely be uploading more vids soon.

[robbie1490]

Looks great, nice and clear like brand new!

[4DIYers]

@robbie1490 Thank you!