Yellowing of headlight lenses

[JeTexas]

This is a project I've been wanting to tackle for a while, but I just recently was able to afford a new set of headlights, so I could pull these out to experiment on them. My 996 headlights have yellowing on the inner lenses from the heat of the bulbs.

My first question is, has anyone succesfully done this before? I'm hoping that if I can get to the inside of the lenses, I can scrub them with toothpaste or headlight polish and remove the yellowing.

The second question is how do I get to the inside of the lens? If I can devise some sort of long skinny scrubber to reach in through the bulb hole that would save a lot of work, but I have doubts that I can make that happen.

The other option is to bake the headlight in the oven sitting on a big block of wood at 300 degrees F for 3 minutes then attempt to pry the outer lens off. Then I could unscrew and remove the reflector and repeat the process to remove that inner lens. At that point I could finally attempt to clean the lens or install HID projectors.

Any advice or words of experience before I start these experiments?

[savowood]

I had the same issue and ended up buying a set of used ones. I surmise that my using the higher intensity SilverStar bulbs is what did it. Back to the regular bulbs for me.

-Michael

[carsareart]

I tried the oven job on a tail light that I replaced a while back. I ended up bending the lens but it did come off. I might of cooked it a little too long. I think I was at 250 for about 20-30 min. I have a old front light now and have been thinking of putting a hole in it to try the polish thing.

Edited November 11, 2009 by carsareart

[mikes_box]

sorry... but those won't polish off... it burnt so in way is that going to polish off... you'll need to take off the front lens but they don't sell replacements for those lenses...

[JeTexas]

I found a Reach toothbrush that bends backwards and spent some time scrubbing through the bulb openings with toothpaste and another polishing compound. No luck. There are projectors from broken Litronics on eBay maybe if I can open the lens I could swap those in.