I happened to go to the local Wal-Mart on North Tryon St. Charlotte NC today and, as usual, I had to park on the far end of the parking lot and had a long walk to the front door.  What amazed me was almost every single car passed on the way in had cloudy, oxidized headlight lenses.  Some of these were so bad I wonder how the people driving them can even see when driving at night.  They were so oxidized and cloudy but I doubt much light could even pass through them.  It's such a shame because some of these cars other than the nasty looking headlight lenses were actually well maintained and good-looking cars. 

One of these cars, a Cadillac, look like it had just been to the car wash and recently waxed and even had the tires sprayed with a shiny protectant like Armor All.  It makes no sense to me as to why people would let the ugly and extremely unsafe condition like clouded up headlights to exist on their cars especially in some cases like the Cadillac or they take great care of everything else in the car but they forgo or forget the headlights completely.  I don't how they can forget that because cloudy, dirty and worn headlights stick out like a sore thumb.

Now not talking about a few cars here, keep in mind I park all the way on the outskirts of the park because it was packed today.  That means I probably passed 70 to 100 or even more cars.  That's a lot of cars with a very ugly and extremely unsafe condition.  I wonder if these people realize that cloudy headlights are one of the leading causes of serious and fatal nighttime car accidents?  It's a fact that cloudy and worn headlight lenses which are caused by oxidation of the plastic headlights greatly reduces light emission through the headlight lens. 

So basically, in layman's terms, if you're headlights become clouded or are clouded then you cannot see very well wall driving at night.  It's that simple.  What causes this clouding of the headlight lenses you might ask, well, for the last 15 or so years the majority and now virtually all vehicle headlight lenses are made out of plastic.  This plastic just like any other plastic when exposed to the sun and the elements oxidizes within a period of a few years.  Some headlight lenses like those in a Mercedes or Lexus have a stronger composite makeup or composition so they tend to last a little bit longer, but the average headlight lens only lasts 3 to 4 years before they start to cloud up and lose effectiveness.

Over time this clouding of the headlight lens gains speed and becomes much like cancer.  Once it starts it just gets worse and worse rapidly.  There are two parts to why cloudy headlight lenses are dangerous.  The first is that it greatly reduces the light output from the vehicle with the cloudy headlights.  The second and less known is the fact that clouded headlights block the initial light output or directional output of the headlight lens.  They then redirect the slight back in and then back out at different angles than was originally intended.  What this means is that instead of the light being directed exactly were we supposed to be is now directed all over the place.  This causes extreme glare for oncoming drivers. 

Headlight restoration made easy as 1,2,3!

Now aside from the safety aspect you have the cosmetic aspect.  If you care about your car and how it looks I don't think you or anyone else who want to be seen with the car with nasty, ugly, cloudy, yellow, and dirty headlights.  Do you?  It makes no sense to me that these people with some of the cars that I saw at the local Wal-Mart takes such great care of their car but completely forget about the headlight lenses.  Maybe they think that it's too expensive to fix them by replacing them?  Well, they're right there.  It is very expensive to replace your headlight lenses with new ones.