Clearing Up Cloudy Headlights
Pat Goss

Here's a problem that has become literally epidemic. Cloudy, discolored headlamp lenses. This is caused by the ultra-violet light from the sun. It attacks the surface of the plastic and causes it to get little pock marks and checks in it and so on, and you see it as this cloudy appearance. That diffuses the light into the air around the car and in general you can't see when it happens. The unfortunate thing is it happens when the car isn't all that old, too. But the fortunate thing will be that most of these can be restored.

If you look at this lens, the left side is very discolored. Over here (right side) we've polished it using a special kit for polishing headlamps and as you can see it looks virtually like new. Now, you have two options. You can take it to the shop. The shop is going to use a power tool with a special buffer, usually operated by air, but the pads and the speed of the buffer and everything are designed so that they won't burn the plastic in the lens of the headlight. Now, this will also involve the use of three different chemicals, there will be a cleaner, that's step number one. Then a restorer that's going to polish the plastic, that's step number two and step number three is a sealer that seals it against the elements and helps reflect ultra-violet light. So, expect to pay something on the order of an hour's worth of labor plus $15 or $20 for the material.

But, there's something else: masking tape. Use masking tape and old newspaper to mask off the paint around the headlight so that you don't get any of these chemicals onto the paint. You don't want to spot the paint. Now, whenever you're dealing with masking tape, get it onto the car and get it off of the car as quickly as possible, never use it in sunlight because it will absolutely weld itself to the paint - you'll have a real mess on your hands. So, on and off as soon as you're done.