How To: Clean and Restore Headlights and Grill
 

This is a quick How To writeup for your headlights and for the waterfall grill.

First: If you need to open the head light for any reason (i.e. remove broken glass from broken bulb)

1 - Remove headlight assembly from car
2 - Remove clips holding the front and back of the headlight together
3 - Pre-Heat your oven to 220 degrees F.
4 - Place headlight assembly on a cookie sheet and place in oven for 20 minutes
5 - Remove CAREFULLY. It will be hot.
6 - Gently pull the front and back of the headlight apart. This will take a good amount of force, just be slow and gentle so you don't break anything. That glue doesn't like to give.
7 - Do your cleaning. IMPORTANT: Use ONLY a microfiber cloth and cleaner WITHOUT Amonia on the reflectors. Mild hand soap and water works the best and is generally safe. (that's the same thing we use to clean professional lighting instruments)
8 - Place the two halves back in the oven for 20 minutes
9 - Remove CAREFULLY. Using oven mitts or something take both halves and press them back together fully
10 - Re-Install the clips holding the light together.

In this picture you can see the clips that hold the light together. One near each side. They're the little metal pieces.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v6...s/Day11013.jpg



Second: To clean yellowed, foggy, or pitted lenses (This works for the waterfall grill as well)

If your headlights look hazy or yellow or pitted like this:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v6...s/Day11006.jpg

To start you will need a few items.

• 600 Grit Wet/Dry Sandpaper
• 1000 Grit Wed/Dry Sandpaper
• 1500 Grit Wed/Dry Sandpaper
• Plastic Polish (I use Meguiar's PlastX)
• Not required, but very useful is an orbital buffer of some sort with a terry cloth cover

1 - Get some kind of container and fill it up with water.
2 - Start with the 600 Grit sandpaper. Make sure you keep everything wet! Sand down until the water stops turning yellow, or until the surface is how you want it. The lens will be very hazy at this point. I start going one way (side to side), then after I'm done I switch to the other way (top to bottom)
3 - Move on to the 1000 Grit sandpaper. Same procedure as with the 600
4 - Now move on to the 1500 Grit Sandpaper. Clean the lens up as smooth as you can get it.
5 - Clean the lens off. It will be somewhat hazy at this point, but there should be no major scratches, just very very fine scratches that make it look hazy.
6 - Apply some of the plastic polish (PlastX from here out) to a rag and begin polishing the lens.
7 - To make this easier, if you have an orbital buffer, use a terrycloth cover and apply the PlastX.
8 - Keep a generous supply of PlastX on the terrycloth cover/lens and polish as long as you like. I've found it helps to clean the old stuff off once in a while and re-apply
9 - I usually do this for five to ten minutes
10 - Using some kind of glass cleaner and a microfiber cloth (doesn't have to be microfiber, but I prefer them) clean the lens.

You should be left with a result similar to this: (this is the same light from above)
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v6...s/Day11049.jpg

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v6...s/Day11050.jpg

And this is the other side that I forgot to take a before picture of:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v6...s/Day11007.jpg

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v6...s/Day11010.jpg




Here is a picture of a grill after the same process. It looked similar to the before picture of the light.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v6...s/Day11024.jpg



As for the rest of the light, Paper towel, a toothbrush, and Simple Green cleaner were all that I used. Patience and care are all that are needed to clean the rest of the assembly.

Before Cleaning
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v6...s/Day11016.jpg

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v6...s/Day11015.jpg

Re: How To: Clean and Restore Headlights and Grill
 

A few After pictures:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v6...s/Day11012.jpg

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v6...s/Day11014.jpg

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v6...s/Day11052.jpg

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v6...s/Day11051.jpg



Now it's time to put your beautiful new headlights back on the car :)

Re: How To: Clean and Restore Headlights and Grill
 

Just a word of caution when using the orbital buffer.
Use a low speed and dont use alot of pressure. If you get it too hot, it will burn the plastic.

Re: How To: Clean and Restore Headlights and Grill
 

Great information!
thank you!

Keith:cool:

Re: How To: Clean and Restore Headlights and Grill
 

Mine is just a cheap consumer grade electric orbital from WalMart. It doesn't go fast ;)

Re: How To: Clean and Restore Headlights and Grill
 

Lucky you!:lol:

Keith:cool:

Re: How To: Clean and Restore Headlights and Grill
 

I think i missed the step for spraying with UV blocking clearcoat.
If you don't use the UV clearcoat, your buff job only will last about 6 months tops.

Re: How To: Clean and Restore Headlights and Grill
 

WOW! Those look great! They look like they're brand new.

Re: How To: Clean and Restore Headlights and Grill
 

Looks great! :)

Re: How To: Clean and Restore Headlights and Grill
 

Mother's Mag and Alluminum polish works great and is fairly trouble free. Mine have stayed crystal clear for at least a year. It might be easier than the above method.

Re: How To: Clean and Restore Headlights and Grill
 

This will address larger and deeper issues like scratches and pitting. And no one is saying you have to do it, I just wanted to share something that has worked for me. To try and give back to the forum.

Re: How To: Clean and Restore Headlights and Grill
 

So you don't need to use any new sealant when reassembling the headlights?

Re: How To: Clean and Restore Headlights and Grill
 

they should be fine with reheating them because the epoxy stays in place.

Re: How To: Clean and Restore Headlights and Grill
 

Whats the reason you take it apart? The inside should be fairly clean already, no?

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Re: How To: Clean and Restore Headlights and Grill
 

In this case, it appeared that a bulb had broken inside each assembly at some point in it's 17 years. I wanted to remove the glass so I could get them as nice as possible to sell. That included removing the shards of broken glass.

Another reason might be if somehow something got inside and managed to make a mess of things. It's far from a needed step, but I wanted to include it in case anyone wanted to know.