So I finally started my retrofit but I messed up my lense already. I was following a retrofit that they did in a recent issue of honda tuning where they used a Acura RL's stock fluted lense and made it clear. I followed step by step and then some. I started with 36 grit on my die grinder, then I went to 40, 80, 120, 180, 220, 320, 400, 600 and then 800 grit. After that I scuffed it with a scotch bright brown pad and then polished it with a blue polishing pad. After that I hit it with some Meguirs scratch x and rubbed it in for like twenty minutes. The pic down below is my outcome. These are the exact steps they took in the writup and there's came out perfect. What did I do wrong? Anyone tried this? Thanks in advance. Don't worry, I bought a spare set of headlights just incase.




Modified by Chef Andre at 12:46 PM 11/26/2007

 

pics?

 

no pics, but I'm guessing you still have lots of polishing scratches and hazing. You need to continue on with sand paper up to at least 2000 grit, and then polish out the haze left by 2000 grit paper.

 

^^Your probably right. It's weird though, they only went up to 220 grit.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Chef Andre &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">^^Your probably right. It's weird though, they only went up to 220 grit.</TD></TR></TABLE>

OUCH man that looks pretty bad in that pic.

I don't think any kind of liquid compound product would be able to remove anything coarser than 1500-grit scratches, and that's pushing it, unless maybe you use a VERY heavy-cut compound and straight-drive polisher. And then you'd have to follow that up with a finer-cut compound.

I think what you need to do is sand that area with progressively-finer sand paper up to 2000 grit, and then get a polishing kit that goes on a drill with a very small diameter pad. Machine polishing will have MUCH better results than trying to polish out sand paper scratches by hand.

When I polish the outside of headlight lenses, I always wet sand up to 2000 grit, and then polish with Meguiar's dual action cleaner polish on my Porter Cable random orbital. But of course you couldn't get the pad on that into the inside of the headlight lens, which is why I'm saying to use a small diameter pad attached to a drill. You'll probably need a helper hold the lens in place on a work bench or other surface while you hold the drill to polish it.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Chef Andre &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">^^Your probably right. It's weird though, they only went up to 220 grit.</TD></TR></TABLE>

That was probably a typo, or just bad information. Using 220 grit for the final sanding would not work well. Perhaps they meant 2000? Also, be careful that you don't generate too much heat while you're sanding, or you'll melt the plastic and make things worse.

I probably would have just left the lenses alone. The fluting shouldn't interfere with the projected light as much as you might think, assuming you're using quality HID projectors and they aren't positioned too far back from the lenses.

 

yeah, you might want to send a PM to user donut. Look for his car in some of the recent pages of the Slammed thread in Appearance/Cosmetic. He's running HID projectors and shrouds behind EG plastic fluted lenses.

 

Thanks guys. I do got a spare set so it's not a biggie. I did do this with an electric die grinder and 3M abrasives. I'll try to fix it tonight and keep you guys posted. Oh and I did PM donut, but I wanted to try to clear that section for better light output.

 

As I said, be careful with the grinder so that you don't end up melting the plastic. That will cause you problems regardless of what type of abrasive you're using.

 

From the look of the pic, seems like you shaved off too much of the plastic, how does it look on the other side?

 

I don't think I shaved off to much but I think heat did play a factor. I have not got around to going to a higher abrasive but I'll let you guys know. Thanks again.