hi guys...
i have a 70 elcamino. i noticed my headlight bezels were looking kinda old the other day. i pulled one out and it has a kind of dull haze over it. there is some pitting and some yellowish crud in some of the cracks and in the valleys where you adjust the headlight height.

i used a little mothers chrome polish and my rotary tool polishing head. it looked a little better but no big differance. i had some glass and plastic polish, so i tried this. again, a little better but no big improvement.

what would you guys recommend that i use? polishing compund? rubbing compound? continue with the mothers?

also.. it looks like the bezel is just pot metal with chrome shot on the front. it i polish too much will i rub the chrome off?

any words of wisdom would be much appreciated - thanks - oaw

hi guys.......

any ideas? i would like to work on this over the weekend. any recommendations would be very helpful. - thanks

The aluminum bezels have clear anoidizing on them from the factory to protect them from oxidizing. To polish them you need to strip the remaining anoidizing off and then it will polish to chrome. Problem is that it will oxidize fast now without the anoidizing to protect it and you will be out there hitting it with mothers polish from now on or let them turn white with oxidation. They say oven cleaner will remove the anoidizing. Remove it, polish, and re anoidize or just buy replacements may be your only options.

I don't think the headlight rings are aluiminum on a 70 chevelle. They are chrome plated pot metal. I'm afraid you will not get them much better than polishing with a little chrome polish or maybe fine steel wool and chrome polish. Mine look as you described and I had to have mine rechromed. They do have repo's of these and they do not fit at all as you would expect from jap crap. Rechroming pot metal is very expensive, I think i paid alittle over 400.00 to have mine done.

thanks guys. i'll keep working with the mothers polish and see how they turn out. $400 is too much for my wallet. maybe in 5-10 years when i do a repaint i'll have them rechromed but not now.

thanks again - oaw

I've used SimiChrome polish for most of my bright ware. Try some of it and some elbow grease before shelling out the BIG bucks. If it's not scratched or dented or corroded, no real need to buy new or reproduced parts - the original was made better anyway.