I recently heard about Pittman's ALR headlight deoxidizer after some discussion on M3F about headlight restoration. Basically it's a one step wipe on liquid that instantly removes headlight oxidation. If you have surface oxidation then it will remove it immediately and make your lights look fantastically better. The ALR won't remove damage (pitting, scratches), but it can make even a dinged up light look better.

I used the ALR on my '02 Hyundai Elantra, and on my '05 3. I actually bought the ALR for the Hyundai as it's lights were very cloudy. The ALR removed all of the oxidation in seconds, however there's still some rough patches present where I think the UV coating is starting to wear away which it didn't remove. That said the lights still look way better than they did before. I also tried it on the tail lights just to see if it would make a difference. The tails looked perfectly fine before hand, but after wiping them down they regained a substantial amount of sparkle, so it definitely did something.

While I had everything out I figured I'd try on the Mazda as well even though it looked fine. There was a marked difference before and after on both the headlights and tail lights. The pictures really don't do the product justice, but I highly recommend this to everyone before trying to sand your lights as the ALR doesn't damage/remove the UV coating on the light housings. It is a little pricey at ~$30 for a 7cc bottle, but I used barely any of it on two cars. I might try and see if I can loan it out to people for a couple of dollars and make some of the money back. Still I think it was a good purchase.

Anyway here's some pictures.

Before
Drivers-Side-Before.jpg?t=1234042760

After
Drivers-Side-After.jpg?t=1234042797

Before
Drivers-Front-Before.jpg?t=1234042844

After
Drivers-Front-After.jpg?t=1234042872

Before
Mz3Drivers-side-Before.jpg?t=1234043737

After
Mz3Drivers-Side-After.jpg?t=1234043729

Before
Mz3-Drivers-Front-Before.jpg?t=1234043768

After
Mz3-Drivers-Front-After.jpg?t=1234043772

 

Dang Remi, It works pretty good

 

Damn it! I used one of the sand paper restoration kits on one of my headlights, and it didn't come out so good. I'll try the ALR on it and see if it fixes the headlamp a bit. Thanks for the info and pics.

 

I don't know how well the ALR will help out an already sanded light, though it should still remove oxidation. What came out badly? Was it that something went screwy when you sanded, or was it that it re-oxidized since you finished it? One of the cool things about it is that it doesn't damage or remove the UV coating on the headlight (which sanding does). If you do get it looking good I highly recommend applying some 3M material (rockblocker, lamin-x, etc.) over it to protect it.

 

The headlight looks like it has a film on it. The light doesnt project as well as my other headlight. When the car is clean, you can't notice it too much, only if you were close to it. It's not horrible, but i notice it, and i feel like i desecrated my car. My other headlight isn't in bad shape. I might just get it for when my other headlight start to oxidize. Also, my brother's headlights are starting to oxidize, so i'll do him a favor.

 

Just as an update I got the chance to use this on a friend's Sentra the other day. Hers is a '02 and the lights were completely frosted over. She'd asked about it while at the dealer one day and they told her it was all on the inside of the lens and that she would need to have the inside of the lens polished to remove it. Let's just say we proved that wrong. Now I didn't take any pictures of her car, however the results were even better than what I posted above. Her lights did end up having some of the same clear coat wearing that the elantra pictures showed and there's nothing to do about that but sand the light. It's slightly sad to see all the oxidation go away just to reveal that, but honestly it was there before and the light output of the lights went way up. Just to demonstrate how bad hers were check out this youtube video..... hers were actually a little more frosted than that.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bYJlIqFz6sM

 

My dad used to tell me all the time that you'd get the same result if you rubbed some toothpaste onto the lens cover. Does that hold any merit?

 

No idea, never heard that

 

hmmm.... toothpaste?... have you tried it? will try ALR, thanks

 

I have heard a lot of good news about Pittman's. That is it works well in headlight restoration. But the toothpaste?! Yeah pal, it worked well (good for the pocket too!). It functions the same way as it functions in silver accessories. Notice that a lot are using toothpaste in cleaning their silver wares to remove the darkening.