What does everyone charge for head light restorations?

Does anyone charge over $60?

Also how often does everyone actually do headlight restorations?
 
Detailed Josh said:
Does anyone charge over $60?

Also how often does everyone actually do headlight restorations?
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I am not sure how many of the responses you got a chance to read. Multiple people including myself said that $60 is not enough money and we all charge more than that for a headlight restoration.

There is no definitive timeline for headlight restorations. There are too many variables in play when it comes headlights.

How low is the vehicle to the ground?
Does the vehicle get driven in winter?
Does the highway department use salt on the roads?
How many miles a year does the vehicle get driven and under what conditions?
Did you apply a UV coating to the headlights after wet sanding?

Even on the same vehicle one headlight can be far worse than the other due to any or all of these factors. I have seen vehicles that are parked outside 24/7 and one of headlights receives more direct sunlight than the other one causing unequal hazing.
 
CriticalDetails said:
Depending on how bad the headlights are you are looking at 2-3 hours of labor plus expenses (gloves, IPA, masking tape, polish, sand paper, etc).
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Why does it take that long? Even doing them with hand sanding it rarely takes more than an hour...
 
CCC4me said:
Why does it take that long? Even doing them with hand sanding it rarely takes more than an hour...
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I will be the first to admit that I am not the fastest at restoring headlights. If you have any tips on how to speed up the process I am open to suggestions. A majority of my extra time comes waiting for the Opti-Lens to dry and cleaning up the sanding slurry.

Most of the time when performing a headlight restoration the vehicle I am working on is not clean so draping a towel on the hood and fenders is not ideal. Sure I could just wipe down the hood, bumper and fenders with a waterless wash and call it a day but I think it looks incomplete. I usually end up washing the paint and glass using a waterless wash and drawing the line at the wheels.

When restoring headlights this is my process:
1. Tape off the headlights.
2. Wet the lens and 800 grit sanding disc
3. Sand 4 passes (2 horizontal and 2 vertical) with 800, 1500 and 3000 grit paper. Between each pass I wipe down the light with a microfiber towel and clean the sanding disc to prevent clogging.
4. Repeat 2 and 3 for the other headlight.
5. Compound the headlights.
6. Polish the headlights.
7. Clean up the sanding slurry.
8. Perform an IPA wipe down on the headlights.
9. Apply Opti-Lens and wait to dry.

Once in a while I will get a pair of lights that only need 1500 grit paper and I can skip the 800 grit.
 
$80-$110 for compleat restoration and re-paint on 2 lights.
but on the less degraded ones that only need a cleanner wax I'll kinda
throw it in for $30 bucks on top of a full detail.
 
I was told I should be charging $75 per headlight, from my processes, steps and sealants I used.

Wet sand
Buff
Polish
Seal
 
My pricing is a little different. I do $75 for the first lens and 35 each additional (same vehicle, of course). This helps cover the initial cost of materials, gas, insurance, etc., if say, they only needed one lens refinished. My pricing is on par to remain competitive. Some dealers here charge $150 (drop off needed), a glass shop does $135 (and a drop off time of a 2 hr minimum). Another local repair shop does $100, all day drop off time, then they said it doesn't last and actually recommended I buy new lenses. Then you also have the local Craigslist guys doing it for $25 for both lenses. I cannot speak for their quality but I imagine they're just using a kit from the auto parts store.

As far as time to refinish them, it normally takes about an hour and a half from start to finish even for some nasty oxidation but I've been known to knock them out in under an hour (depends on the veh make). HOWEVER, I recently did a few Volvo's that had some severe oxidation and and the small areas that still had the factory coating left were extremely difficult to remove. I had to use extra materials and also drop down to 400 to "get down to the good stuff".
 
Critical Details, thanks for the long responses. Also on how often I meant how often you get customers, not on each specific vehicle. Which I hope with using Opti-Lens that it lasts a while..

I practiced on my fiance's car last week. It took me a while to do a quality job like you mentioned. Although I didn't wetsand all stages except the 3000. Maybe I should try wet on all the others to speed it up as I noticed sanding did take a while.

Also for speeding it up. Do you think switching between each headlight on each step is more productive or doing one headlight start to finish? As in sand with X grit, switch to other headlight and sand with X grit, and then once you're ready for the next step switch grits and repeat process.

Yeah I'm thinking of still lightly covering the front end of the car with a sheet/etc. even if it is dirty, but still doing a quick wipe down with a Quick Detailer so I have less of my mess from the process to clean up.
 
Detailed Josh said:
Critical Details, thanks for the long responses. Also on how often I meant how often you get customers, not on each specific vehicle. Which I hope with using Opti-Lens that it lasts a while..

I practiced on my fiance's car last week. It took me a while to do a quality job like you mentioned. Although I didn't wetsand all stages except the 3000. Maybe I should try wet on all the others to speed it up as I noticed sanding did take a while.

Also for speeding it up. Do you think switching between each headlight on each step is more productive or doing one headlight start to finish? As in sand with X grit, switch to other headlight and sand with X grit, and then once you're ready for the next step switch grits and repeat process.

Yeah I'm thinking of still lightly covering the front end of the car with a sheet/etc. even if it is dirty, but still doing a quick wipe down with a Quick Detailer so I have less of my mess from the process to clean up.
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You're welcome. I have three sanding pad interfaces and keep a different grit on each one (800, 1500, 3000). I perform all three stages of wet sanding on one headlight and then switch to the other headlight. Once all of the wet sanding is performed I compound and polish one headlight at a time.

I only perform a handful of headlight restorations a month. Half of the time a customer will buy a stand alone Headlight Correction and the other half it is an add on service.
 
CriticalDetails said:
You're welcome. I have three sanding pad interfaces and keep a different grit on each one (800, 1500, 3000). I perform all three stages of wet sanding on one headlight and then switch to the other headlight. Once all of the wet sanding is performed I compound and polish one headlight at a time.

I only perform a handful of headlight restorations a month. Half of the time a customer will buy a stand alone Headlight Correction and the other half it is an add on service.
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Do you charge different if added on to another service?

Also do you see a difference in scratches removal between jumping from 800 to 1500? I did 800 dry, then 1000 dry, and then 1500 dry, and finally ended on 3000 wet. 800 took a while to remove the oxidation so I ordered some 600. Maybe I need to just do all wet to reduce grit choices?
 
Detailed Josh said:
Do you charge different if added on to another service?

Also do you see a difference in scratches removal between jumping from 800 to 1500? I did 800 dry, then 1000 dry, and then 1500 dry, and finally ended on 3000 wet. 800 took a while to remove the oxidation so I ordered some 600. Maybe I need to just do all wet to reduce grit choices?
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I charge the same amount whether it is a stand alone service or an add on service. Occasionally I will run a discount on paint corrections to entice people to spend more money than they usually would on a detail. If a customer who buys a paint correction also wants a headlight restoration I will extend the discount.

I restored a pair of headlights a few recently that had seen better days and the 800 grit wasn't removed the deeper scratches. After that detail I bought some 500 grid sanding discs so I am prepared next time. For 90% of the vehicles I work on 800 grit is more than enough and occasionally I will only need to go down to 1500 grit.
 
CCC4me said:
Why does it take that long? Even doing them with hand sanding it rarely takes more than an hour...
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Do the headlights that you restore in an hour look this bad? I spent just shy of three hours restoring these headlights.

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ACu1yRyjzOU]Car Detailing: Headlight Restoration - Honda Civic, GoPro Hero3 - YouTube[/video]
 
CriticalDetails said:
Do the headlights that you restore in an hour look this bad? I spent just shy of three hours restoring these headlights.

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ACu1yRyjzOU]Car Detailing: Headlight Restoration - Honda Civic, GoPro Hero3 - YouTube[/video]
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This was a great video! Always learning something new here on AGO.

Thank You Critical Details for the video and awesome work
 
Critical,
Great job on those! Yes I've done them in that poor of condition, and I've done them that large, but never both. I also don't OC in the timeframe I mentioned. It looks like you do a very nice service for your customers and I hope you're able to make money doing so.
 
In South Jersey pending on the condition of the lights. I usually start around $75 - $100 that includes all major lights only (head, tail and fog lights.) I wet sand by hand then finish up with some polish. If they are really bad and it's gonna take too long to wet sand by hand I keep a 3M kit in my inventory. I bill the additional cost of the kit to the client.
I use a plain paint sealant and offer Opti-Lens as an up sell. So starting at $75-$100 your getting at least 4 lights done, 6 if you have fog lights. It's rare that you come across damaged turn signal lights or break lights.
You have to make sure you are covering your expenses and getting paid well for your work. Don't forget you have to tape out. That's an expense. Make sure you roll that cost into the job.
 
hernandez.art13 said:
This was a great video! Always learning something new here on AGO.

Thank You Critical Details for the video and awesome work
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You're welcome. Thank you for watching.

CCC4me said:
Critical,
Great job on those! Yes I've done them in that poor of condition, and I've done them that large, but never both. I also don't OC in the timeframe I mentioned. It looks like you do a very nice service for your customers and I hope you're able to make money doing so.
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Thank you. This was one of the more damaged headlights that I have restored. I usually don't have to use the 500 grit but when I do I know that the results are going to be quite remarkable. Headlight Restorations definitely aren't my most profitable service when you factor in the cost of supplies. It costs me more to restore a set of headlights than it does to detail the interior of a vehicle

inDetail said:
In South Jersey pending on the condition of the lights. I usually start around $75 - $100 that includes all major lights only (head, tail and fog lights.) I wet sand by hand then finish up with some polish. If they are really bad and it's gonna take too long to wet sand by hand I keep a 3M kit in my inventory. I bill the additional cost of the kit to the client.

I use a plain paint sealant and offer Opti-Lens as an up sell. So starting at $75-$100 your getting at least 4 lights done, 6 if you have fog lights. It's rare that you come across damaged turn signal lights or break lights.

You have to make sure you are covering your expenses and getting paid well for your work. Don't forget you have to tape out. That's an expense. Make sure you roll that cost into the job.
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I have thought about allowing customers to add additional sets lights to the restoration at a discount. Do you ever come across fog lights that are just too distressed to be restored or too hard to reach.

The fog lights on my Subaru Outback have seen better days. The lights are recessed quite far back in the bumper and I don't know if I could restore them on the car.
 
Awesome video Critical Details. I also like how you popped the hood the minimize contact as I was just thinking the other day when doing headlight restorations. What is it that you used to apply the Opti-Lens? How come you don't use the provided yellow foam applicator pad, or the blue squeeze tip?

I think doing a discount for added on lights is a plus, but just not sure what to do with recessed lights like you said. I feel like taking them out would be the best option, but that's not really worthwhile unless you charged more.
 
Critical details said:
Do the headlights that you restore in an hour look this bad? I spent just shy of three hours storing these headlights.
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Wow. 3 hrs with a DA? I would have thought you'd be done in an hour using a machine. I've had to remove some factory coating (with lots of scratches) by hand but still done in 2 hrs. I'm sure you can do a few things to cut down your time if we know your breakdown.
 
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