3M 39073 Headlight Lens Restoration Kit to Restore Dull/Faded/Discoloured Headlights For Car, 1 Pack, Smoke

Within an hour a dull headlight had been transformed to looking almost like new. Remarkably easy to use as long as you have a standard household drill.

I’ve tried several kits in the past with their buffing tools and abrasive oils and gels and they’ve always fell incredibly short, especially considering how pricey some of them are. This was an absolute last resort for me otherwise I was looking at buying and fitting a new set of headlights due to the excessive yellowing and now incredibly scratched plastic.With some patience, this kit genuinely brought them back to life. It definitely requires a steady hand and to have another drill battery fully charged on deck but it was able to bring back my 2005 RAV4 headlights that hadn’t been restored successfully ever. With this kit I also had enough remaining pads and buffing cream to also do my other cars headlights and it brought them up as well.So ultimately it’s excellent value for money, I was able to do two sets of headlights from one kit! They came up super bright and clean. I would recommend though to buy a clear coat spray lacquer to seal it though just to ensure it is durable for the future!

A good product that restored 11 year-old lights pretty much as described. The before and after pictures in the advert and in customer reviews closely match my own experience.Written instructions are clear and the video on the 3M site is helpful, but could have given a bit more detail in how to go about the job – felt more like a montage of before and after pictures.Job took me about 2.5 hours, including several readings of the instructions and views of the video.The drill bit and sanding/ polishing pads all worked well although as other reviewers have noted, you have to be careful removing the pads from the bit as the heat softens the Velcro layer on the bit and it would easy to take the Velcro off with the old pad.I only have a couple of issues. First, there wasn’t enough masking tape in the pack, I bought an extra role which was needed. 3M’s examples are for relatively small lights, with simple shapes. I was working with a single headlamp / side indicator unit that wrapped round the front corner and extended back into the wing some distance and needed more tape than supplied. Dropped a star in the review for this.Second issue - more to do with my lights than the product. The grinding/ polishing pads are very effective on simple profiles. My lights have a recess around the main projector lens on the front and the section in the wing where the indicator sits has five profiles, all of which are quite shallow. This meant that the pads could only contact across a small section of their area and quite often the edge of the pad was grinding on the neighbouring profile. All this made it hard to get into the edges of the profile for a consistent finish. It’s minor – there are some bits that I will get back to with wet n dry paper by hand – but something to bear in mind if your lights aren’t the relatively simple designs used in 3M’s examples.Overall, good product and happy to recommend.

Providing you follow the instructions step by step and take your time you can achieve a very good result.Overall a good product which does as intended. I wouldn't hesitate in buying the same product again.I have attached before and after photos.

I have an SLK Mercedes and I dread to think how much new headlamps are - they were becoming yellow and crazed as a result of sun damage - not so bad that it was going to fail an MOT - but I am trying to sell the car and so looks are important - the end result is so good I wish I'd done it earlier!.Apparently the UV from sunlight penetrates the outer layer of the plastic and dries it out causing the damage - this kit restores your headlights by physically removing the outer layer by abrasion and then restoring a polished finish - for me it was quite a leap of faith in the product - deliberately scratching up a perfectly serviceable headlamp seemed a bit risky - bit I needn't of worried - 3M do good kit.There a re a few videos on YouTube which were informative - albeit some were a bit slow - but it gave me the confidence that what was happening was quite normal - the headlamps will look worse before they look better - the instructions that came with the kit were more than adequate.The only stuff you need other than this kit is a cordless drill, a spray bottle of water, some cloths/kitchen roll and if you are working with the car bonnet up - I would recommend a dust sheet to protect the engine compartment from splatter - just saves a bit of cleaning afterwards - and wear old clothes - you will get splattered.The kit comprises of a Velcro drill attachment and 3 different grades of Velcro-backed abrasive paper, masking tape, Velcro-backed polishing pad and a sachet of polishing compound - I recon there's enough to do 2 sets of headlamps depending on how badly they are damaged.After cleaning both headlamps and masking all the bodywork around both headlamps I attached the coarse abrasive paper - took a deep breath, fired up the drill and set to work. On the first headlamp I made the mistake of only sanding the damaged area - by the time I got to the end - the undamaged area stood out because it wasn't as shiny! - so do the whole headlamp.Apply gentle to firm pressure and use cloth/kitchen roll to wipe away dust every few minutes, you can see the damage areas disappearing through haze of the plastic - by the time you've finished this stage the whole headlamp will be opaque - it should be a fairly even level of opaqueness throughout - have faith - it will get better.You then repeat this process using the next finest grade of paper - by this time the look of the headlamp is beginning to improve.Next you use the finest grade abrasive pad - this is where the water spray comes in - this grade is on a foam pad and you use the water spray to keep the area wet - this is where you begin to get splatteredFinally you use the polishing pad and polishing compound - again - keep it wet.After a final wipe down the finished result was amazing - I went back over and touched up any bits that didn't look perfect - I can't fault this product. It took 1 fully charged battery per headlamp.