Dulled taillight restoration with Meguiars ScratchX

Voodoomelon

Hey all.
Just a couple of pictures of what a few minutes with Meguiars ScratchX 2.0 cream can do for dulled headlamps/taillights.



This stuff is actually designed to remove light scratches and blemishes from car paintwork, but having used their PlasticX product before on clear lenses I guessed that this stuff is pretty much the same thing. Is has very small abrasive particles in the cream that grind away at any impurities/scratches leaving a smooth, clear finish. Fairy liquid and other detergents just don't work on these surfaces.

My problem area on the car is the rear reversing lights on my E38. The problem is common to all E38s; it appears that the reversing bulbs burn incredibly hot and as such the lense gets dulled very quickly, you'd want to do this every 6 months the problem is so bad.

The reversing lense is the top right one, it should be the same clear colour as the corner lense.




Using a circular motion produces the best results, you can almost see the tiny particles in the cream in this picture.


This is just after wiping the lense for about 20 seconds with hardly any pressure. Cleaning the lense off and repeating 7-8 times with increasingly more pressure produces the same amount of dirt nearly every time.


Here's the lense after a few applications, much better!


Here's the right hand lense completed compared to the left.


And finally, both sides finished, like new!


€14.00 for the bottle, much cheaper than a new taillight cluster.
Great product, give it a go.

MetzgerMeister

Great DIY! Very similar to my headlight one!

Voodoomelon

Crap, didn't see your one!
Ah well, another won't hurt.

MetzgerMeister

I used Meguiar's Deep Crystal Polish rather than scratch X so I'll let you off this time

Owen

Great to have another DIY guide. We need some stickies now to collate em all! Including VB's servicing guide.

All we need now is someone to do mechanical stuff, brake pads, that kinda thing.

Voodoomelon

I had a fully documented brake change, inc pads, dics, fluid and lost all the pictures.

Slidey

I could have easily done a Hilux timing belt one. Had the damn thing on and off at least 3 times last Thursday. Mystery oil leak eventually traced to a crack in the timing case.


Will probably do one for CV joint on a MK4 Golf in the next fortnight.


@OP, good job, might give me lens' a blast soon

I Was VB

Holy jaysus the boot on the 7 is tiny!!

Voodoomelon

Looks small there, goes back really far.
Its huge, me and a mate both got in there once, both 6ft, 14st. I like proving points...

I Was VB

Voodoomelon wrote: »

Looks small there, goes back really far.
Its huge, me and a mate both got in there once, both 6ft, 14st. I like proving points...

Maybe so, but on that pic it looks small wouldnt think it could take any golfclubs. Even so i like playing tetris with my boot everything fits in nice and neat. One fare i had to get 3 golf clubs, three suitcases and it fitted in nicely. Looks of the 7 two suitcases and a umberella would be fecked!

But even at that not many of its competitors have bigger boots, W220 is tiny, as is the LS430. Madness on cars that cost 100K+ new.

Voodoomelon

I guess it must look really small then.
E38s can take three sets of golf clubs no problem, comes with a factory sticker showing how, with room to spare.

The newer E65 boot looks even smaller than the E38, not sure if it is though.