The TRUTH about OFF & Toothpaste vs Headlights! (+Update on WD 40)

I had to do an update from my last WD 40 vs Headlights video. I also decided to see if the MYTH was true if OFF would restore the yellow foggy part of my headlights. I used OFF bug spray on one headlight and toothpaste on the other to see what happens !

Please follow me on Instagram and Facebook @yakmotley!

If you are looking to move to Florida email me! I am a Real Estate Agent!

This video is for entertainment purposes only and just a fun experiment.

[dwarfhernandez]

If only the headlamps were still made of heavy glass, this wouldn't be an issue.

[jimkeogh]

the Off didn't really help clear my headlight lens, but there have been no mosquito bites anywhere on the grill for the past month.

[KB-kefi]

Back in the day, our headlights were made of real glass. Never had to worry about it.

[RoniconJK]

I’m gunna start brushing my teeth with Off!

[davidayablonskysr]

No matter what you use to clean your headlight lens, the trick is to scrub horizontally ONLY. The cloudiness is crazing cause by dust impact and UV deterioration. If you scrub round and round or both sideways and up and down, it aligns some of the crazing but scrubbing in one direction only leaves a clearer and longer lasting lens.

[pcmedic]

If the headlight manufacturers did their job properly nobody would have this problem! One could accept this happening after 20 years, but not a few years. Unacceptable!

[alananolan]

I bet your wife was impressed when she saw the dirty bathroom towel! 😁

[Misstisha]

you talking about "I'm too cheap to go buy another headlight" ME

[jdgower]

What causes the headlight lenses to get cloudy like that is something called "crazing" - which is when the UV light from the sun attacks the outer surface of the plastic and causes a lot of microscopic cracks in the surface. This diffuses the light hitting the surface instead of letting it through and makes it look cloudy.
Liquid products like OFF and WD-40 and even water, just fill in the cracks and make it look clear again. Of course, water evaporates quicker than oils, so it doesn't last as long, but even the oils will eventually wash away or evaporate and the headlights are still crazed like before.
If you had washed that OFF off with soap and water, it would have looked like it did before.

What actually works is plain old cheap buffing compound, a clean rag, and about 10 minutes of scrubbing in small circles all over the lens. The toothpaste will work some, but you need to scrub it on with a rag and not a toothbrush, plus you need to scrub a lot longer than five minutes.
Buffing compound has a little more aggressive abrasive, so it works faster than toothpaste, but it still takes some time and elbow grease.

It basically ablates the cracked surface and gets down to a new, smooth surface. It will stay clearer longer, but eventually will have to be done again due to continued crazing by the sun. My experience is that I have to do it every 12 to 18 months, depending on the car.

[timandrochellemellin-contr]

What people fail to tell you is that toothpaste works like rubbing compound...you rinse your headlights and put a quarter sized amount on your buffing wheel and polish your headlights on high speed. Then make sure you follow up with headlight polish to prevent your shiny headlights from fading in the sun. Restoring headlights is basically removing the damaged top coat of plastic. The problem with all restore jobs is that you end up removing the hard factory finish so you keep having to polish with rubbing compound and polish it once a year to maintain it.

[jebbohanan]

If you want to clean your head light plastic, use a wet 3000 grit sand paper, keep the water hose dribbling on the plastic as you rub in circles.
After you have cleaned the gunk off,
Then use chrome polish and a buffer wheel to polish back to a shine.

THEN MOST IMPORTANTLY
SPRAY THE CLEAN HEADLIGHTS WITH UV PROTECTIVE CLEAR PAINT!!!

You should be able to get all the necessary stuff at your local hardware store.

This is a ONE TIME AND DONE FIX!
At least for me it has been.

[lennyd.]

I'm retired. I don't drive at night. No headlight problems. 😁

[herminioamuniz]

" Remember, I'm not a scientist. I'm just a dude spraying OFF on some headlights". Absolute gold. Haha

[R.N.GPerformance]

The absolute best way to clean these up. Start off with 600 grit sand paper sand it until the whole thing is hazy. Then go to 1000 grit. Then move to 2000 grit. Then get some good wax and a buffer. It will last a very long time. I do them all the time for people at work.

[dwbmd]

OMG! I see where you get the “Yak” moniker. This could have been three minutes long at most.

[jugmothafukr]

I've used Ben's 30% deet and it actually melts the film off of the headlight vs cleaning or filling cracks as some people think it does. You can feel it start to get tacky, then see it start to remove the foggy layer altogether. Once it's looking clear, one last wet wipe to allow it to glaze over and you're set for 6-8 months or longer. Fastest, cheapest and easiest method to restore headlights imo.

[kilroy]

Many year sago we traveled to a place where insect repellant was necessary, so we bought some stuff that had a very high content of DEET. Much higher than OFF! During the trip it leaked and the plastic cosmetics bag my wife had it in partially melted, so yes, DEET is a solvent to plastics.

[larrydunnington]

I use an electric grinder on mine, and it ground all the plastic off, no plastic no problem

[TsetsiStoyanova]

That bathroom towel will
Never be the same again

[chrisbaust]

Compound and if you have buffing wheel definitely makes a difference than seal it with a good polish to prevent future damage