<Project> 2000 Trans Am

[Lucky SOB]

What would the point be?

My theory is that clear coat would be more resistant to scratches from towels than the raw tail lights

[OVRKILL]

negative. maintain the lenses as you would on your paint and they'll always look good! its funny if you think about it. you'll polish a car for hours and lenses will take minutes. acrylic lenses are harder than your clear as well....the clear on your paint will scratch easier.

[Lucky SOB]

negative. maintain the lenses as you would on your paint and they'll always look good! its funny if you think about it. you'll polish a car for hours and lenses will take minutes. acrylic lenses are harder than your clear as well....the clear on your paint will scratch easier.

Well that clears up that issue! Thanks Bret

[ThreeHonks]

how did you polsih your lights fred?

[Lucky SOB]

how did you polsih your lights fred?

Wet-sanded to 1600 or 2000, can't remember which. Then I took them to the machine shop that I used to work at. They have a couple of stand up buffing jacks that look like this...
577110K_main.jpg

and use wheels similar to this...
BG150BW.jpg

Now, with wheels like this you apply a hard compound to the wheel while it is spinning. The compound comes in "brick" form and gets transferred into the fabric of the wheel when you touch it to the wheel. These compounds come in different variations of "coarseness", so just like sanding - you start coarse, and work to fine. The same is true for the wheels, there are different materials with different textures.

Buffing metals with a machine like this is truly an art. I have light experience in this practice, but can do a decent job. It is mostly meant for polishing metals like stainless steel, or plated metals like chrome.

So basically when you're buffing an object, the compound transfers from the wheel to the part, and will build up in crevasses and other such lips and forms. I had a lot of "thrown" compound built-up around the lip of the reverse lights. That's when I hit them with lacquer thinner and shortly after, felt like throwing up.

[ThreeHonks]

Thanks Fred!

wow that is sad. so after you got done putting all that work into the lights is when they cracked

[1BADAIR]

How much did you cut the back springs? what is the advantage of a v6 spring? i heard they are nice to have for the strip?

sorry about hijacking your thread fred...

dont remember 1.5 coils maybe. cut 1/4-1/2 coil at a time until i got what i wanted.
98+ v6 rears are the same as ls1 v8's. people use the softer springs to get the rear to squat. but girls squat , race cars should not.
if set up correctly they really dont do much

[Gottork]

fred your tailight polishing is still up on this thread right, with pics?

here is also something I forgot I had, if it helps any for ryan

http://www.thirdgen.org/techboard/fa...polishing.html

[Lucky SOB]

fred your tailight polishing is still up on this thread right, with pics?

here is also something I forgot I had, if it helps any for ryan

http://www.thirdgen.org/techboard/fa...polishing.html

Yes, probably a couple hundred posts back or so Good thread on TGO

[Gottork]

Yes, probably a couple hundred posts back or so Good thread on TGO

sorry did not mean to post useless info..lmao

but yeah I saw this and REALLY enjoyed your break down of the polishing so thought maybe this could add to your repertoire

[Lucky SOB]

Any thoughts on how to fix this...? It's not scratches on the back or front, looks like the plastic was stressed on the inside.

[OVRKILL]

replace. sorry Fred.

[MP81]

Yeah, that's busted.

[Gottork]

your not having any luck with tailights buddy
sorry

[Lucky SOB]

Step 1 in the undercarriage cleaning project...




I can't wait to start it up tomorrow Didn't want to wake up the neighbors tonight...