Polishing the headlights from the inside with their own hands: instruction, useful advice, feedback

Care of the car is not only periodic visits to the maintenance centers, but also the careful attitude of the owner to him. To the car looked like new, did not have visually noticeable defects, it is important to regularly pay attention to every detail, including headlights. After all, they are not just a lighting device. The "eyes" of the car are the highlight of its design.

Why do I need to polish the lights?

Unfortunately, the appearance of lighting devices with each year of operation of the vehicle only worsens. Lanterns fade, become yellow, scratched. When looking at such headlights, the first thing that comes to mind is to replace them urgently, but for sure every motorist knows how expensive an enjoyment is such a procedure. Do not rush with radical measures! There are many options that will help restore the former gloss machine at home. Polishing the lights with your own hands is a great way to transform a car with minimal financial costs.

What should I buy for home polishing lights?

Services to restore the presentability of the appearance of cars are provided in specialized technical centers and car washes. Polishing the headlights from the inside and outside, as a rule, is not a separate type of service, and therefore it is carried out in conjunction with other works. Independently to put in order lanterns on the car any interested person can. Here's what you need:

• Shampoo for car body;
• Soft, lint-free towels;
• Adhesive tape (normal scotch is suitable);
• Sandpaper of fine and coarse grain;
• A liquid atomizer;
• Special paste for polishing;
• Grinding machine (if possible);
• Finishing polish.

With your hands: the main principles of polishing the headlights from the outside and inside

Acquire half of the above means is not necessary in the presence of a grinder, with which help to gloss the lighting fixtures from the outside in a few minutes. When polishing the headlights from the inside, on the contrary, it is more convenient to work with your hands. To ensure that the end result meets expectations, it is important to pay attention to the basic rules of processing automobile lanterns at home:

• The procedure should not be carried out once: in the polishing the lights will be needed after a couple of years.
• To use abrasives, it is necessary to resort only when other means are powerless (with chips, scratches, serious injuries).
• When doing polishing work, you can not press on the glass (plastic) of the car headlight.
• To wash the car it is undesirable to use aggressive chemistry - such mixtures make the surface of the body vulnerable and weakened.
• Do not polish at temperatures above +20 ° C and below -10 ° C. If the temperature regime is ignored, the risk of deformation of the light emitter increases several times.

Substance for the restoration of automobile headlights at home

The polishing of the headlights from the inside is performed much less often than from the outside. To clean the inner surface, you have to disassemble the lighting device, and this, in turn, will take additional time. In addition, during disassembly, there is always the risk of damaging the headlight. To polish from the inside resorted in the event that the external surface treatment did not affect its state and light transmission.

Having decided to transform the surface of automobile lanterns, one should also think about the choice of polishing paste. The substance is selected according to various parameters, but the priority is given to the state of the polished surface. But even with serious violations of its integrity, it is undesirable to make a choice in favor of aggressive compositions with solid particles. In the presence of scratches and chips, defects are filled with polymer solution or varnish. Then the treated surface is carefully dried and only then they start polishing the headlights with their own hands. From the inside at home it can be done both with the help of professional GOI paste, which is sold in any car dealer, and using ordinary toothpaste.

Than to grind a surface: GOI paste

In the first case, it is a mixture used for grinding plastic products. Today, however, like many years ago, GOI paste is still available in jars or solid bars. Convenient creamy consistency allows you to economically use the substance. The instructions for polishing the headlights from the inside with the help of GOI paste can be briefly described as follows:

• A soft mixture is applied to a soft cloth.
• Rub the paste carefully, taking care not to scratch the surface. It is desirable to avoid sudden movements.
• To remove the mixture from unnecessary sites use kerosene.

Tooth-paste for polishing plastic headlights

The polishing process itself will not have any fundamental differences due to the change of active active substance. The versatility of the chemical composition of the toothpaste makes it possible to use it for glass and plastic headlights. In addition, the mass is easily soluble in water, there is no need to use a special solvent. However, in comparison with GOI paste, which simultaneously polishes and polishes the surface, it takes more time to surface the toothpaste.

An effective polish can be called a mixture of toothpaste and GOI in equal proportions. The obtained composition copes well with the cleaning of scratches on the plastic, therefore, for polishing the glass, the lights from inside are rarely used.

How to start surface treatment?

Armed with all the necessary tools and polishing compounds, you can start work. Conditionally polished headlights are divided into several stages:

• preparatory stage;
• Selection of sandpaper;
• Polishing of the outside;
• Processing of the inside of the headlamp.

The principle of preparation for the procedure is the maximum cleaning of all the nearest surfaces of the body. For high-quality polishing of headlights at home, you need to apply every detail to your hair, shampoo the shampoo and rinse it off with water. It is possible to wash the machine several times in order to make sure that there is no dust, sand. Any solids during grinding of surfaces can damage it.

How to choose sandpaper for manual polishing?

When starting grinding and polishing works, it is necessary to secure the adjacent parts of the car body adjacent to the headlights. Places of joints of a paint and varnish covering with a plastic headlight it is desirable to stick an adhesive tape.

At the stage of direct grinding of the outer side of the car lanterns, it is important not to be mistaken with the choice of sandpaper. The principle is this: the more noticeable the damage on the plastic, the abrasive material is needed. If the headlight is initially in poor condition, it should start with the use of coarse-grained sandpaper - from 600 units. Subsequent polishing is performed with finer materials. To polish the headlights from the inside with their own hands begin, as a rule, immediately with small pelts.

Step-by-step grinding of the outer side of the car headlight

It should be noted that for the polishing of glass headlights, mixtures with more solid particles are chosen. Diamond paste will help to achieve the desired result. The method of its application does not differ significantly from the previous one. Correct treatment of a car head implies:

1. Wetting the sandpaper and applying a prepared paste to it.
2. Grinding is performed in circular motions in the cross direction: up-down, right-to-left.
3. After the first procedure, the remnants of pastes and abrasives must be washed off with clean water.
4. Then, grinding continues with fine-grained paper.
5. If there is a machine or a drill equipped with a polishing wheel, grinding is performed for 5-7 minutes.

Machine polishing and finishing varnish

After grinding, the surface of the headlights will be matte, but you do not need to be afraid: after polishing the car will again shine. Before polishing the headlights, it is necessary to wipe the plastic with a microfiber. Further processing will occur as follows:

1. A polishing nozzle is put on the machine (instead of it you can use a drill or a Bulgarian).
2. The minimum amount of polishing is applied to the disk of the device, after which, at low speeds, the paste is carefully distributed over the surface of the lighting fixture.
3. To polish the headlights you need to smoothly, in a circle, moving to the edge from the center.
4. It is important to ensure that the surface of the lamps is not heated by friction polishing device.
5. Each headlight needs to be processed for 5-7 minutes.

To fix the polishing effect on the headlights, additional means of protection are applied - varnish or wax polish. To cover the glass surface will take significantly longer, it is important to give the layer of varnish completely dry. Otherwise, covering the headlights in the near future will start to swell and flake. As soon as the finishing polish dries, the surface is polished for the last time.

How to polish the headlamp from the inside: the features of the process

The final stage will be internal polishing of the headlights with your own hands. At home, toothpaste will be an ideal tool for processing plastic from the inside. As already mentioned, with the need to polish the headlights from the inside, not everyone is faced. Still, even a beginner can cope with this work. There are no significant differences between the external processing of headlights and polishing from the inside, the main thing is to act according to the suggested step-by-step instructions:

1. It is necessary to remove the scotch that connected the edges of the headlight and metal body, then dismantle the headlight from the car.
2. If the glass has cracks visible only from the inside, it does not make sense to polish it - it is necessary to change such a lighting device for a new one.
3. If there are no defects, the lamp cover is thoroughly rinsed.
4. Grinding the headlights from the inside is done exclusively by hand.
5. Use sandpaper of fine grain. For grinding, a small pea of toothpaste is enough.

Polishing the inside of the plastic headlamp is done according to the previously described principle. In order to qualitatively clean it from the inside, it will take additional time, but after assembling the headlight and installing it in place, everyone can be proud of the work done!