Why Do Headlights Become Hazy?
Take a quick look at the headlights of a new car. The acrylic is perfectly transparent and you can see all the details of the projector behind him. Look now at your own car. A few years ago and a few thousand miles. The headlights also have an unpleasant and hazy appearance. Beyond cosmetics, hazy headlights are dangerous for safety, darken the beam of light and make it harder to see in front of your car at night.
What are your options, then? Do you have to replace your misty headlights? Fortunately, you have a less expensive option: restore your headlights to their original state with a professional flagship restoration.
Why the Headlights Become Dangerous?
Time and the environment do everything possible for your headlights. Fog develops due to:
- Oxidation: If you park outside, UV rays from the sun are on your car all day. As these harmful rays reach the acrylic lights, they oxidize and become slightly yellow over time.
- Driving Conditions: The headlights are made with a hard topcoat, this layer eventually fades when the headlights take a beating of small rocks, road salt and other debris flying over when cruising on the highway. Niches and scratches attract mud, dirt, and dust, darken lenses and make it harder to see when driving at night.
- Water vapor: The headlights have a waterproof seal to prevent moisture. If this seal breaks, condensation may form inside the lens, which prevents you from wiping it. Water droplets scatter light from the bulb to further reduce nighttime visibility.
It’s easy to think that because hazy headlights occur naturally, they do not require any attention as the car ages. This false assumption leaves many cars with obscured headlights, resulting in more accidents and endangering.
Fortunately, instead of paying hundreds of dollars to replace both headlights every few years, you can repair your existing headlights for a lot less. But should you try to clean your headlights or restore them professionally?
DIY Cleaning in Relation to Professional Headlight Restoration
Headlight restoration is not the same thing as cleaning the headlights. Cleaning DIY headlights may seem effective at first, but the results generally last for 30 days or less, because the abrasive chemicals used to clean the headlights remove any protective coating left behind. This means that the moment you hit the road, all the problems that caused your scrambled headlights first work much faster to redo the damage.
The restoration of the headlights is different. Yes, cleaning is the first step, but it does not stop there. The next step is to polish the headlights to remove scratches that obscure the light and attract dirt. Restoration may also involve attaching the headlight seal so that condensation does not form inside the lens to obscure your vision.
The last step, which makes the biggest difference of all, is to seal the headlights. This protects the acrylic and prevents the bugs from coming back for a year or more. The sealant must be a high-quality product to work well, which is why the professional service is superior to DIY headlight restoration kits.