Fog Light Stone Chips

[ScottD3]

That's not bad.

Tempted to try something like this first before I start replacing.
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/140741735381

At least if all goes wrong it looks like I can by two from poland for the price of one from the UK.
That's shocking innit.

[M-A8]

Scott, don't, I've tried it, its pointless.
Stone chips are just impossible to polish out, I have wasted an hour of my life on this.
Scratches, yes, but not chipped glass, its just to deep and polishing off a half a mm across the whole surface is just impossible.

BUT, hold one, both of them are different from the one I have.
First one has a lens inside the unit (like the Xenon lights) and its much longer at the back which is kind of obvious as the bulb is fairly set back.
The other one has no lens like mine but it is a H8 like the first one.

Mine looks like the second one (no lens) and it takes H7 bulbs not H8

Was there a upgrade on the fogs (lens) ??
Are the H8 ones only for the D3s before the single frame front grill was introduced??

I like the ones with lens and I would be keen to fitting a adaptor if necessary, just need to check if there is enough room behind it for a longer unit

[M-A8]

See attached

[ScottD3]

Could always just put yellow tape over the front of the fog lights and give them a euro look.

Yours look the same as mine.


I do like the look of these lights.


They are more like projector fog lights.

[mannyo]

My 2004 pre facelift has the projector style foglights.

[ScottD3]

so there's 3 types of fog lights?

[Delboy]

If the chips deep enough you could try this and then polish

[ScottD3]

I bought this stuff.
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/140741735381

I'll be trying it this weekend and I'll report back.

I had a look at the chips and I don't think they was deep enough to warrant the filler but they might be to deep for the polish to work but I'll try.

[ScottD3]

I tried the glass polish over the weekend and it did not go well.
The glass on the lenses is some sort of bullet proof harden glass.

Before.


One Polished and one's not.


No different.

Might go Orange fog light tape. lol

[aTOMic]

Originally Posted by ScottD3

...

Might go Orange fog light tape. lol

I wonder if the adhesive on Lamin-x (or a similar protective film) would be thick and compliant enough to fill those divots?
You'd think there would be a way to fill them in with clear epoxy and then wet sand & buff them until even.

I am a bit of an abrasives expert, having sold them for 10+ years; factory-trained, etc. ,etc.. It's all about using the correct abrasive and removing enough material so the chips aren't visible, then progressively finer grits and finishing with buffing compound. You might have to start with 36 grit and go through 8-10 steps finer... time consuming but effective. Wet-sanding all steps and high RPM (die grinder) are your friends.
3M has a kit which has their excellent Trizact abrasive. Amazon.com. You must use an abrasive specifically for glass (silicon carbide, diamond, cesium oxide, etc). and I'd try to get a 2" "Test kit"; we gave them free to prospective customers, but I see 3M sells them for $229. Might be worth finding an industrial supply house/abrasives supplier and talking to a salesman there; might need to slip him a few "quid" for some samples, if he won't help you, ask him where nearby they use glass abrasives.
If the girl at the desk is snotty tell her you're building a new glass plant for GM or Alfa and wanted to check out local supply houses. THAT will get their attention.

We had a guy come in asking as a hobbyist about some special masking tape. The receptionist (owner's wife) treated him poorly; but I took him into the warehouse and gave him samples of the tape and several things I thought he'd find useful which he hadn't even heard of. Turns out he owned a large factory (making residential windows) nearby and became a $100k/year account for me.

Good luck either way
Tom