Making your own Headlight Lenses

I just fill the holes with hot glue.

Very clever, Pete, and a lot cheaper than buying individual lenses, if you can find them.

Do you use the drill press to actually punch the hole?

@West Side Joe posted:

Do you use the drill press to actually punch the hole?

I do. Being plastic it doesn't require much force. You can use any clear plastic. I made a few using packaging material. Its just not quite as flat as the cover slips.

Pete

I've used a set of punches like are used in leatherworking to make belt holes. That's how I made the turn signal lenses on this Mack out of colored plastic sheet. But their edges were not as super clean as your lenses came out.

I have used cork borers, basically a thin metal tube with sharpened ends to make clean holes in plastic. I hold it against the plastic and heat it until it pushes through. Makes a cleaner hole than twisting the borer as you would in cork or rubber. The center piece you remove isn't as clean though as its in contact with hot metal longer and gets distorted.

Pete

@Norton posted:

Every once and while someone asks about a source for headlight lenses. I have been using this method for decades first for HO, now O scale. Technique is simple only requiring a set of drill bits and some hard metal. I have used mild steel, brass, and this time some hard alluminum alloy. You want a piece around 1/4" thick so it doesn't bend when you punch out the lenses.

Just measure the diameter of the headlight opening and find the closest drill bit that is less than that diameter. Then drill a hole in your scrap metal. Start the drill on the bottom side of the material or if its flat just drill a hole. Then flatten the back end of the drill bit as best you can starting with coarse sandpaper to fine like 800 grit. The finer the better to avoid scratching the plastic. I do this with the drill inserted the wrong way in a drill press. For a curved lens use a file and sandpaper to round off the outside edge of the bit. Finally polish the end with any polishing compound you have.

This headlight has an opening of .362". I used a T letter drill at .358" to make the hole and punch out these lenses using plastic microscope cover slips.

Pete

Hello Pete,

I tried to follow the described process, but it wasn't making much sense to me.  Could you post a couple of additional photos showing some to the described in between steps?

Thanks!

Kazar, basically you take a piece of scrap metal and drill a hole in it using a drill close to the size of the lens you want to make. Flip the scrap piece over as that side should have a cleaner hole. Sometimes a drill will wander until the sides are below the surface and the top edge will be uneven. You want a sharp edge there. Then insert the drill bit in your drill press the wrong way and use the drill shank as the punch and your metal piece as the die and place a piece of plastic over the hole and punch out a disk.

I think you would need a drill press to do this, not a hand drill.

This has the advantage of making a lens that is not an exact fractional or metric dimension which using a punch and die set might limit you to do. If it turns out the headlight is some common size like 1/4" the you could drill the hole with a 1/4" bit and use a piece of steel 1/4" rod instead of the drill bit.

Pete

Here are some pics.

Pete

I have made exact head light lens for post war Lionel engines.  The head light lens are solid plastic.

I use a clear plastic rod, one source is a clear plastic rod used sometimes adjust mini window blinds.  If the diameter of the rod is too large to fit in the hole on the locomotive, reduce it by shaving it down with a knife or file until it fits in the hole in the locomotive for the head light.  Some of these rods are not circular but hexagons that can be used after shaving round.

I then heat a piece of flat metal ( like a steel angle used for bracing corners) in a vise with a soldering iron or torch from the bottom.  I then hold the plastic rod exactly vertical and perpendicular over the flat hot metal and press it down to flatten out the end to over hang the rod diameter by about 1/32 of an inch all around.  It may take practice to do it right.

If the tip of the rod looks like the original head light of the locomotive, I cut the lens off the rod to be about 1/4 inch long.  A fine file is used to smooth the sawed off end of the lens.  I then use rouge to smooth and polish the flat end of the new lens.  I sometime use Maquires Plastic X (which is a plastic polish used renew and to remove the yellow on clear plastic car head light covers)  to polish the end of the lens.

Charlie

Wow, you guys are hardcore!  I use the internet.

Glad someone has the drill press for this.  Pete you make things look simple.

@Norton posted:

Kazar, basically you take a piece of scrap metal and drill a hole in it using a drill close to the size of the lens you want to make. Flip the scrap piece over as that side should have a cleaner hole. Sometimes a drill will wander until the sides are below the surface and the top edge will be uneven. You want a sharp edge there. Then insert the drill bit in your drill press the wrong way and use the drill shank as the punch and your metal piece as the die and place a piece of plastic over the hole and punch out a disk.

I think you would need a drill press to do this, not a hand drill.

This has the advantage of making a lens that is not an exact fractional or metric dimension which using a punch and die set might limit you to do. If it turns out the headlight is some common size like 1/4" the you could drill the hole with a 1/4" bit and use a piece of steel 1/4" rod instead of the drill bit.

Pete

Dear Pete,

Thank you for the clarification of the process.  I really appreciate your reply to my note.  I understand fully what you are doing and it is a very quick and easy way of creating missing lens's for headlights.

Thanks again!

Let me add I used to build things for a living. We had a saying if you can buy it, then buy it, because you can't build it (in most cases) for what its going to cost you in time and money to make it.

In this case I make lenses when there are no alternatives like for brass castings or the manufacturer no longer has the lens or headlight available.

Pete

I learned from an HO friend of mine to use a glue called "Sobo", which you can get at Hobby Lobby, etc. It's a fabric glue, I believe. White, dries clear. There may be others like it.

Using a toothpick, I start swirling a small blob of glue around the inside of the hole until it fills in/grabs all across the opening. Let it dry (with "face" of lens fairly horizontal); can take more than a day to become clear, and until it cures, it can look a bit foggy in lower temps. That all goes away. If you think it should be thicker, you can add an additional drop or two to the surface and let it dry and cure.

It seems stable and tough enough to do the job. Easily re-done if needed, I would think.

Also good for smaller window "glass" and the like.

D500

I like that method of making lens.  I am always learning on this OGR forum.

Charlie

If you build 1/25 scale model cars you wind up with a large collection of clear headlight or spotlight lenses that can be used.