The headlight lenses on my vehicle (a 2001 Ford F-150) are cloudy, and presumably as a result, the headlights are not terribly effective. (I could post a photo if you want.)
I bought a polishing kit (Mother NuLens) and used it as directed. The cloudiness improved slightly but is still pretty bad.
From other questions on this site, the next step appears to be attacking the lenses with various grades of sandpaper and finishing with a final polish. Given my general level of automotive incompetence, I'm guessing this will take me at least a couple of hours (including the return trip to the store when I inevitably discover I've bought the wrong kind of sandpaper, or not enough). The materials will also cost something, and I don't discount the possibility that I'll massively screw up and irreparably scratch or crack the lenses, damage the paint, or perhaps just burn the truck down to the chassis.
So before I get started, I'm hoping to get a sense of what kind of results I can expect for my trouble. If I do things properly (far from a safe assumption), should I end up with glistening, showroom-new headlight lenses, and finally be able to start blinding drivers in the opposing lane? Or is the best case a marginal improvement in clarity and brightness?
Cause unless I can really expect the polishing to make a pretty significant difference, I'd rather save myself the carpal tunnel and just get a new set of lenses (even if that means replacing the whole headlight assembly), possibly from a junkyard.
Something like before-and-after pictures would be great, provided they come from a real person and not a polishing-kit vendor.
(This is somewhat related to New headlight lenses? but a bit different.)