Really looks great! I need to do mine

 

What's the preferred method for plugging the front license plate holes?

 

I just used the 3m headlight refinishing kit on mine and it worked awesome.. its pretty cheap to i think it was 30 bucks. if you get this one i would recommend getting 2 .. 1 for each headlight

 

Www.bumperplugs.com I haven't used them yet, but a lot of people swear by thier customer service and products.

 

I found a homemade recipe for headlight sealant in the Autogeek detailing forums. It is 50% mineral spirits and 50% Helmsman Spar Urethane (clear gloss). You mix it up and then wipe onto the headlight (after polishing) with a blue paper shop towel.

I did this on a "guinea pig" BMW 3 series about 6 months ago, and it is still holding up quite well. Others online report that 2 years later it is still doing fine.

 

I used these guys and their quality is good.

http://www.bumperplugs.com/

 

They don't have any dealers in my area. So I then talked about becoming a dealer myself. I'm reading their literature right now.

 

If you search on their site some of the franchises have a mail in service, if your comfortable shipping,and suffering the down time

 

I searched and found a 3M kit on-line that uses a similar process like the Dr. Headlight process and I'm going to give it a try. Their process requires a high speed buffing process, with multi grades of fine grit, water based sand paper. They finish it if with a sealer type finisher as well. I'm game to see what it does. I'll post a thread about the process and outcome when I'm done.

Thanks for the tips and heads up.

 

Again... the sanding and polishing is the easy part. Any of the kits will do a decent job restoring the color and clarity--and total removal of the clear coat. The Turtle Wax kit comes with a life time supply of "clarifying" polish that I use on lots of plastics.

After polishing your lenses (no clear coat) they will turn yellow and haze in 2-3w, they will look worse than before polishing since you just sanded off any remaining clear coat. Replacing the clear coat is the real issue. The clear coat that came with the Turtle Wax kit lasted 2-3 months before I could see degradation. Not good.

 

j beede - I understand you're making your statements based on experience, so I respect them. Then what are my options, other than replacing the headlight assembly? Dr. Headlights seemed like the logical option but with no dealer in my area to offer services, that option has gone to the wind. And, I'm not really comfortable with shipping my lens across the county to have someone restore them. What are the replacement costs? Has anyone priced them recently, or done the replacement option?

 

Dr Headlight is only one of many different kinds of companies that do this sort of work. Just do a search on your local Google pages or even ask a body shop who they would use. The important thing is to make sure whoever does the work applies the clearcoat to it.

 

I just saw a Krylon UV protectorent spray at my local Michaels craft store. I wonder if that would work. It came in gloss and matte.

 

Sounds interesting... I will check out the Krylon and may try it on my Nissan "transportation appliance". Since I polish my lenses every couple of months--I have no issue with trying just about anything on them I have not tried any aerosol product due to concerns with overspray. I'll just use more masking than usual.

 

Thanks for the suggestion, I'll look into this. Can you provide a link where it was discussed?

S.