550 headlight restoration

Hi guys. Finally, I have got some time to make my 550 happy. During the last days Enzo and I have had some relaxing days with zero stress and now when my hood is re-painted with very good result, I found out that my headlights don’t look too appealing. I mean, I have already sanded them and polished them, but they have had quite a lot of mini stone ships, and the wetsand/polish thing just is not enough. So I took the lights out and took them completely apart and fixed them properly.

I attach some pictures. I start to understand why these are so expencive. Lots of parts mounted into each other with great precision and quality!

1) Taking the glass off of the unit. One came off easily. The other one was glued in place and took quite some struggeling to get off. Patience, brutality and some simple tools was the trick. The rest took a few minutes to take apart with just a screw driver.

2) Cleaning, compunding, polishund and waxing the housing with the exterior paint. It made a huge difference.

3) Paint the light housing matte black like original. I suspekt they have fadde over the last 20 years and just needed a new later of paint. It also made a big difference. Now they look really good and gives a better contrast to the almost black paint.

4) Polish the reflectors with a super soft towl and mild glass polish. (The chrome layer here comes off with the slightest pressure when rubbing...), so it must be done very gently!

5) The ellipsoid ”eye” had much what I call erosion (lookes like mini stone chips) on it. Very hard to understand why it was like this when they sit under that big glass. I took a chance and clear coated them. Time will tell if the paint will last og peel off or fade yellow.... At least now I know exactly how to clean or change them!

6) Sand and clear coat the glass which seems to be a lexan plastic material. Had to plane sand it after I sprayed the first layer. Then apply a second coat of clear coat to fill up the small ”holes” in the surface. Then sand again. 1200, 2000, 6000 and rubbing compound and polish. Came out really good. We will see with time how the paint reacts to heat and wear. At least the car will look ”new” for a while.

Took some time but well worth it. She must look like new this season. No excuses for a bad looking Ferrari 550 Maranello..... I just have to take one step at a time! Age is slowly getting back a real lustre. I really love this car. It is beautiful from all angles.


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A few more. I had to do this to get the glare in the glass away. I look forward to install them.
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Ok. Yes, I will definately check out the clear bra. Thanks for the suggestion. I guess it is from 3M right? Can you see that it is put on? I also considder to get a ceramic coating on them aswell as on the complete car. It should save me many houres of cleaning and polishing the car.

About the rubber gasket... Those are actually just between the headlight and the wing, front trim and hood. I believe it sticks on with a kind of double sided tape. So you take off the protective tape before you put it on the headlight and then install the headlight into the car with the new gasket on. I will replaced them and get them sent from Eurospares to my Swedish adress before Brexit to avoid 25% VAT. In addition to the rubber gaskets around the headlight, i sealed the glass to the headlight body with clear silicone to make it 100% waterproof. The rubber seals is probably meant to avoid sand and water to enter the engine compartment and to make the headlights have a tight fit.

The roads here are slowly beginning to get clear of salt and sand. But the new taxes supposed to take action around 1st of July in Norway make me wait to get the new Norwegian registration plates, because it looks like all cars of twenty year of age will have no tax, just like for oldtimers today when they are minimum thirty years old. The tax is around 10.000 euro now so I have to wait until 1st of July... The 25% Norwegian VAT is already paid and will still apply for all imported goods regardless of taxes. So it gives me time to make all the small projects I have been thinking of doing with the car. It just cost a few bucks...... The car had been standing completely still for five months, but started right up as it should and everything is working normally. It is a bit funny that even if the car is standing in a garage with no more that 7-8 degrees C, the cooling fans goes on after only a few minutes. That car has seriously much heat to take away. And the Mercedes 200 CDI i drive these days, have to be driven at least 10 kms. before you get any heat inside the car...!! So actually the Ferrari is the car that would be great on cold winter days


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