I'm about to leave the house for new years party but a question just popped into my mind: is it possible to polish plastic to a factory finish and if so, how?
I figured as this is an international forum and we have different time zones I might have an answer by tomorrow when I'm sober again. :D
I saw people polish optics and lenses.. but how good does that turn out?
they have kits to restore your headlights. from what ive heard it comes out pretty good.
Novus makes plastic polish. It can turn out well, but takes a lot of work.
I’ve researched this before, and some metal polishes such as Brasso or a Silver polish work beautifully for polishing scratches out of plastic! This technique has been discussed on CPF before, and is where I learned it.
I’ve used Brasso to polish my Subaru Forester’s cloudy / scratches headlights, and acrylic flashlight lenses, and they’ve all come up perfectly crystal clear!
Try it using a soft cotton (microfiber should be fine) cloth or rag, dampen it a little, then use small amounts of Brasso at a time and don’t be afraid to put some force into it. Work in a circular motion, and your plastic will become clearer and clearer the more you work on it.
It worked on my flashlight lenss and my expensive car headlights, so it should work for you.
Good luck, and Happy New Year!
In a pinch and on a budget, I’ve used toothpaste to polish some shallow scratches out of cheapy lcd screens on crappy watches. That worked ok.
Depends on the plastic. Some polish well, some don't. What are you trying to polish?
First thing is the "glass" of an old Swatch watch thats really abused. I think I can handle that.
Second would be a Carclo XPG optic I want to use with XML, thats the hard part.. opening it up with a drill works pretty well but I cant get it really smooth. scaru did the same on his triple XML and (imo) his didnt turn out that well either.. its really hard because of the small space. :D
I didn’t know Poland produced plastic.
They do, its reported some of them even have electricity and tap water! :D
It's certainly true, the optic didn't work that well. But I thought you decided to de-dome? Or you could just do what I did and go mule? ;)
PlastX works good on car headlamps, i would think it will work well for most clear plastics. Simichrome also works great for all kinds of polishing, might be worth a try.
I'm in the same state as you are with your gender preferation: undecided.
*duck and cover*
No, srsly ;) I don't really know what I'll do by now.. but no mule. Mules suck. :P
I'm coming for you... :P Good luck with the mod though!
I use some “PlastX” cleaner that I got at an autoparts store, it works well when you just buff it by hand with a microfiber cloth but it takes a bunch of effort/time. I use it to clean up faded optics and remove some treatments that sometimes go funky on plastic/polymer based optics.
Using a plastic “cleaner” however will not restore any additional applications that were on the lens such as anti-scratch, glare and fog applications leaving a very soft, scratchable surface. It would be best to protect or re-treat the surface after cleaning it. On some auto applications some light cleaning does not remove the surface of the UV treatment entirely (It can be applied in a mat like form, much like window tints) and can just remove surface contaminates, making the surface look cleaner.
Don’t use too much force/speed on an automated machine or you run the risk of damaging the plastic/polymer from heat/friction.
I use MAAS on TIR optics, but not after "opening them up", LOL. Kind of ruins them. Also it will probably screw up the beam profile. I think you might need to get some TIR optics for the XM-L from CNQG. Anyhow, are you drilling the optic out? If so, try a very slow speed, but I don't think you can polish enough to make it work right.
You could get it as smooth as possible and spray it with clear Acrylic paint, or clear enamel paint. That will make the plastic "look clear" again.
OL, no one makes a triple or quad XM-L optic. :(
I had a rev counter from a classic car with heavy scratches on its plastic screen.
Used wet and dry paper(400-600-1000?) followed by Autosol on a cotton cloth.
I've used car paint polish on headlights with great success. I got the Novus plastic polish kit for eyeglass lenses and motorcycle visors.