How NOT to polish road pitted fog lights!

Well figured I would attempt to glass polish the road pits out of my foglights on my 328... Gathered all materials & started to sand off the pits (following directions) when all of a sudden that "noise" occurs.... followed by thoughts of hearing the song "i'm a loser babeee so why dont you kill me" ....

Yup, I did the dreaded why fix it if it aint broke... Needless to say it looks worse now than when it was in 1 piece road pitted...

So now this has become the "how to replace your fog lights" thread.

Step 1 . Remove the top skinny lens (amber on US spec) once that is removed you will see two screws (actually 3, the third one is below the removal screws- it aims- leave as is). Once screws are out Pull the inner lower bottom to you- its on a socket will pull loose easily)
Step 2. Remove the two connectors from behind your assembly is now free from the car.

Step 3. To remove the glass lens requires seperating the majority of the old caulk from the base of lens... The housing has a "u" channel that the glass sits in... its about 3/8" deep & when it was new they ran a thin bead of silicon caulk or something like that & set the glass lens in it. The caulk is now adhered up inner & outter edge as well as across the bottom to your existing lens.

Step 4. If your lens is already broke its alot easier to get out - all the remaining lens is bonded to the assembly by the 3/8" bead around bottom lip. Obviously if lens is broke you can see how to take a razor to slice through the caulk & ultimately remove pieces..

If however you wish to remove a complete glass (why who knows, maybe to replace with a new reproduction as I am).. its trickier & will take at least an hour of patience, trust me if you are easily excitable - you will need to be medicated.

What I did was slice with a razor & a x-acto knife all the way around the lens & down in that 3/8" lip all the way around. You will end up digging out a mm or so of "width" caulk.. take all of it out- again be patient- your existing lens is worth $$$$'s. Once that was all removed I tried a small screwdriver to pry up GENTLY on a narrow side of lens... first attempts will yield NO movement - what you need to do is try to get a tad lifted or the lip of housing bent enough to try & drag the x-acto knife under the glass lens. The whole key is realizing that the lens has caulk on both sides of lip as well as bottom. You want to remove as much as possible to aid in ultimate lifting.

With repeated trys & several small screwdrivers on the narrow side I could see a VERY small gap. When I was about ready to give up, it finally gave way & lifted, removal was finally possible. A complete lens (right side) in 1 piece.

Friday (tommorrow) my new replacement lens will be here. They are supposed to be exact dead on match crafted of a tough polymer & look like exact glass replacements - even though they are not glass. All correct markings supposedly you cannot tell the difference. To me this is wonderful, after a 9 month restoration the lens being road pitted annoyed me.

The top skinny lens I was able to use plastic polish & a buffing wheel to restore. Looks great. That one is originally plastic to begin with.

Friday I will show installation of the replacement lens-

Anyone have an idea what a glass lens foglight (right) side worth? The replacements were also very pricey but seeing what goes into making it I can understand why.

Chris
Image Unavailable, Please Login
Image Unavailable, Please Login
Image Unavailable, Please Login
Image Unavailable, Please Login

 

Here are pics showing housing before being molested, also picture of the remains & finally a clean free of lens housing
Image Unavailable, Please Login
Image Unavailable, Please Login
Image Unavailable, Please Login

 

Here is pictures of the right side lens I manage to seperate from housing using above technique (patience is paramount).
Image Unavailable, Please Login
Image Unavailable, Please Login