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In this review, we take a look at the best headlight restoration kits for returning your tired headlights to their former glory. Headlights are an essential safety component of a car and keeping them in tip top condition should really be top of your priority list.
Unfortunately, headlights degrade over time and start to become a safety hazard with their reduced visibility and performance. It’s at this point where a headlight restoration kit can work wonders and get your headlights working back to their best. Using a headlight restoration kit will not only drastically improve the appearance of your vehicle, but more importantly will increase safefy whilst on the road for yourself and others.
We take a look at the best headlight restoration kits available on the market.
What Is A Headlight Restoration Kit?
A headlight restoration kit provides you with everything that you need to restore your faded, dull headlights.
There will be a slight difference between which each kit contains, but generally speaking, they’ll all feature pretty much the same items. You’ll usually get the following items
- A mixture of cutting discs to cut away the oxidized layer on the headlights
- Cutting compound
- Polishing pad(s)
- Masking tape
Only Got 5 Minutes Spare?
In a rush and would like a brief summary of our top picks? See below
Our Top Pick Headlight Restoration Kits
Best Overall – 3M 39073 Headlight Restoration Kit
- Usable on various other plastic surfaces around your car
- Allows for use on tail lights
- Restores faded and cloudy headlights with ease
- Clear and simple instructions to follow
- Utilises the power of a household drill
- Features an easy to follow, 3 step process
CHECK LATEST PRICE ON AMAZON →
Second Choice – Meguiar’s G1900K Headlight Restoration Kit
- Fast and easy to use
- Can be used on various other plastic surfaces around your car
- Restores faded and cloudy headlights with ease
- Great results
CHECK LATEST PRICE ON AMAZON →
Best Value Choice – Turtle Wax 51768 Headlight Restoration Kit
- Easy to use
- Cheaper alternative to most others
- Contains sealing wipes for added protection
CHECK LATEST PRICE ON AMAZON →
What Are The Benefits Of Using A Headlight Restoration Kit Instead Of A DIY Method?
Using a headlight restoration kit instead of a DIY method is much quicker and also easier to achieve great results. The beauty of using a kit is that you have everything you need in one box to get maximum return for your efforts. With the aid of a headlight restoration kit, you can easily restore your headlights to their shiny former glory.
When using a DIY method, you’ll have to purchase everything seperately (i.e sandpaper, cutting compound, polishing pads etc). You’ll also get no instructions or step step guides on how to get the best results.
It can be a bit daunting when using sandpaper on a car, and you technically could do some expensive damage if you aren’t careful. A headlight restoration kit gives you much more confidence and peace of mind that you can tackle the job and get great results. A headlight restoration kit also contains everything that you need to get the job done in one hit.
What Causes Headlights To Fade And Discolour?
Headlights fade and discolour over time for a few different reasons, but mainly because they are constructed from plastic and plastic oxidizes due to UV damage from harmful UV rays.
Many years ago, headlights used to be constructed from glass but were replaced with plastic headlights for a few reasons. The main problem with glass headlights was safety. When involved in an accident, headlights would often smash and the glass would cause horrific injuries to pedestrians or other road users. Thankfully, technology and manufacturing processes have improved significantly since then and we are now driving much safer vehicles than we were all those years ago.
Another major reason for replacing glass headlights with plastic ones was the ability to easily create much more attractive shapes and sizes. When constructed from glass, it was extremely difficult for manufacturers to shape the glass in a shape other than square. Hence the design language of 90’s cars being very square and angular.
Constructing headlights from plastic instead of glass allowed for manufacturers to be much more creative in their headlight designs and has resulted in some of the spectacular designs that we see today. Whilst constructing headlights from plastic has significantly improved the aesthetics of vehicles, it does unfortunately come with the trade off that the plastic eventually disclours and fades.
When your car left the factory, the headlights would have been protected with a UV resistant layer to help resist oxidization and fading. Over time, this UV eventually breaks down which then causes the lenses to suffer from discolouring.
During the winter months here in the UK, our roads are often covered in rock salt and this too is harmful for your headlights and can cause yellowing and fading. If left on the headlights for a long period of time, the rock salt will eventually start to cause discolouring on the lenses. As you’re driving along our roads, the car in front is essentially throwing lots of nasty objects from the road at your cars front end. Your headlights are subjected to stones being thrown up at them, salt, grit, mud, leaves etc.
You may not be aware of this, but some car cleaning products can also cause your headlights to fade. For example, an acidic based wheel cleaner can discolour the plastic of your headlights if it comes into contact with them. Needless to say, it’d be foolish to use a wheel cleaner on your headlights but it’s something to be aware of and try to avoid coming into contact with your headlights.
What Are The Biggest Benefits Of Using A Headlight Restoration Kit?
There are many benefits to using a headlight restoration kit, namely the additional safety it provides to yourself and other road users.
- Increased Safety
Simply put, a discoloured and faded headlight can be extremely dangerous on a car. It can have a severe impact on the light output from your headlights and massively reduce your visibility on the road at night. The primary function of headlights to illuminate the road ahead of you and make your car as visible as possible, having faded headlights can severely negatively impact this.
- Increased Vehicle Value
Another added bonus of using a headlight restoration kit is the increased value and kerb appeal it’ll place on your car. If you’re looking to sell your car and it currently has faded headlights, it’ll be dragging down the value of the car and ruining the overall look of it. With minimal time and effort you can have the headlights shining again like the day they rolled off the production line.
- Removes Scratches
A headlight restoration kit can often remove nasty scratches from your headlights. Scratches on cars often reduce their value and affect the overall look of the car.
- Saves Money on New Headlights
Using a headlight restoration kit instead of buying new headlights will result in you saving a lot money. New headlights for modern cars can cost upwards of a thousand pounds per light and result in an extremely costly bill.
- Increased Visibility
When driving at night time, it’s really important to illuminate as much of the road in front of you as possible. This is not only important for yourself but also important for other road users.
Using a headlight restoration kit can hugely improve your night time visibility which is an extremely important safety consideration.
- Retain your original car headlights
The use of a headlight restoration kit allows you to retain your own car headlights and save on installation costs of new headlights. Also, new headlights can potentially de-value your car if not installed properly.
Can My Car Fail An MOT For Having Faded Headlights?
Yes, your car can fail an MOT test due to faded headlights. Here in the UK, all cars are required to take an MOT test once per year to ensure that they are in road worthy condition and are safe for use.
During the test, the MOT tester will measure the output of light from your headlights and if they don’t provide enough light output, you’ll be issued with a fail certificate.
At this point, you’ll likely be told that you’ll need new headlights in order for your car to road legal and issued with an MOT certificate. The cost of new headlights can be extremely expensive and often runs into hundreds of pounds. Most modern cars use LED technology for their headlights, these are extremely expensive when they need replacing and can cost well in excess of a thousand pounds each.
Using a headlight restoration kit instead of buying new headlights will save you a small fortune and make your car road legal once more.
How Long Will It Take To Use?
It should take no more than around 30 minutes to get both of your headlights as good as new again. This may vary depending on how badly faded and oxidized your headlights are but as a general rule of thumb, 30 minutes is more than enough time. 30 minutes of elbow grease will result in your headlights looking like new again and also drastically improve the performance of your headlights and night vision.
Can I Use A Headlight Restoration Kit On My Tail Lights?
Yes, you can use a headlight restoration kit on your tail lights. Tail lights are made of the exact same material as headlights (plastic), and therefore will respond in the exact way to the treatment.
Tail lights don’t appear as faded and oxidized as headlights due to their darker lense colours but using the kit on them will certainly improve the overall look of your car and ofcourse provide added safety with better light output.
How Often Should I Use A Headlight Restoration Kit?
This will very much depend on your location and climate but here in the UK, once a year should be fine. You may need to increase this to twice a year, but this absolutely should be sufficient to keep your headlights in tip top condition.
Another big contributing factor to this is how often you wash your car. Washing your car regularly and using the correct methods will ensure that all harmful deposits such as rock salt are safely removed before they can inflict any damage.
Have you read our step step guide on how to wash your car? It’ll provide you with some great information on how to keep your car looking it’s best and free from harmful deposits.
Do I Need To Be Experienced At Working With Cars In Order To Use A Headlight Restoration Kit?
No, absolutely not. Headlight restoration kits are extremely easy to use and are designed for use amateur enthusiasts. They are presented in a simple, straight forward setup.
By following the detailed instructions inside the kit, you’ll be able to achieve great results without having any prior experience. That’s the beauty of a headlight restoration kit, you could be lumbered with an expensive bill to replace your faded and tired headlights – yet with a little bit of time and effort, you can transform your headlights back to their absolute best and save yourself a fortune in the process.
Ofcourse, if you’re skilled and experienced at working with cars then using a headlight restoration kit will be a walk in the park for you.
Our Top Pick Headlight Restoration Kits
Best Overall – 3M 39073 Headlight Restoration Kit
- Usable on various other plastic surfaces around your car
- Allows for use on tail lights
- Restores faded and cloudy headlights with ease
- Clear and simple instructions to follow
- Utilises the power of a household drill
- Features an easy to follow, 3 step process
CHECK LATEST PRICE ON AMAZON →
Second Choice – Meguiar’s G1900K Headlight Restoration Kit
- Fast and easy to use
- Can be used on various other plastic surfaces around your car
- Restores faded and cloudy headlights with ease
- Great results
CHECK LATEST PRICE ON AMAZON →
Best Value Choice – Turtle Wax 51768 Headlight Restoration Kit
- Easy to use
- Cheaper alternative to most others
- Contains sealing wipes for added protection
CHECK LATEST PRICE ON AMAZON →
Just so you know, we may earn a small commission through the links on this page but we think that’s a fair trade off for the hours research and time that we put in.