How to Remove Scratches from Transparent Plastic

I'm sure you guys all know the pain of a getting a nice bit of retro swag, only to find it's covered in scratches. Jewel cases are particularly bad when it comes to scratch-ability, but don't worry, there's a solution!

While you can try and buff the scratches out with toothpaste, you normally end up trading big scratches for a series of small ones. What I've found works really nicely is this stuff:

Meguiar's PlastX, it's intended for removing scratches and clouding on car headlights, but it also works really well for removing scratches on other transparent plastics, in particular CD jewel cases.

Here's a good example, I've got a Playstation case that was all scratched up and treated just the center for comparison:

Much better isn't it? Those "specks" you can see is actually dust that's on the other side of the plastic, so ignore those.

I also treated the jewel of an Xbox, it certainly helped to remove the light scratches, but I coulden't really remove the deeper ones. This is probably because the plastic is harder than the plastic used in jewel cases, maybe multiple treatments would slowly improve it.

Anyway, I hope you guys found this to be helpful!

 

Interesting, my guess would be it that stuff would probably work in a similar way. Is it a thick cream? I looked on ebay, but I didn't find many repair compounds (a lot of screens though), the only one I found cost more than this stuff I got.

 

the 3m headlight repair kit will do the best job if there are large scratches. it essentially resurfaces plastic.

 

That plastx stuff was good, used it on our V35 skyline. What was cool though ours was a black sedan, just like on the bottle! Allthiugh that is probably a G35...

 

Do you have a link to that one? I only found a big sponge thing that would be too unwieldy to use on small items.

Have any of you guys tried removing scratches from non-transparent plastic (i.e GameCube badges)? I'm not sure what would happen if I tried using this stuff on non-transparent plastic, since it's designed for use on transparent plastic.

 

i can second this, the few things i've anti-scrached, i used a screen compound meant for cellphones (OOOOOOLLLD ones) which seems to work very well.
I even salvaged a scratched to death beta of magna carta with the stuff, (was unreadable when i bought it ;___

the stuff i have is called Displex, but i'd assume there's a lot of brands around.

 

I use this stuff to remove scratches from shiny parts of consoles (PS2, Nintendo Gamecube Logo, etc). Comes out at least almost scratch free. You got to put alot of elbow grease into it though.

http://www.ebay.ca/itm/Novus-Plasti...PACK-/111171424191?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash

 

Thanks for the info. I've seen those Meguiar Plastx last time i went to a big hardware store.

Will get one next time.

 

So the PlastX could repair the scratches in a 3DS' top screen?

 

That stuff seems pretty good (it has a bottle for heavy scratches!) but holy shit! Shipping to Australia is $40!

Possibly, depending on how deep the scratches are. You can see in my OP the sort of scratches it can fix, though jewel cases are made of a soft plastic so a 3DS screen would probably require a lot of elbow grease and repeated applications.

 

http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/Pinball-...141083444093?pt=AU_CoinOp&hash=item20d93a837d

Here you go, you going to need about 3 microfiber clothes for each step bottle.

 

Nice find, thanks! They listed them under "pinball machines" that would have made finding them a challenge

About the microfiber cloths, do you recommend the ones with the long fibers or the flat ones that you use to clean glasses?

*EDIT found an even cheaper listing on ebay for them!
http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/NOVUS-Sc...518?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item5ae704360e

 

Ah Novus 2 and Microfibre cloth/Magic Eraser, the classic combination for 15 year old dirt on a pinball playfield.

 

I have a game gear with a pretty scratched screen, I was going to use my Dremel with a polishing wheel but I may give this a try instead, thanks for sharing.

 

Reviving old thread, yah!
As Master of Puppets asked, could Plastx remove those bezel to top screen markings on an original 3DS screen?
Or rather, has anyone tried to remove those markings with Plastx?

 

Actually I bought this machine recently. It is amazing for things like Jewel cases and game gear screens. It can help for CDs too but I would not use it on any valuable disc.
https://www.caswellplating.com/buffing-polishing/buffing-kits/cd-and-plastic-buffing-kit.html

Edit: I tried Plastx before buying the machine and I thought it sucked. I dont have 3 hours to manually buff a game gear screen.

 

You can also buy the third party replacement polish for the JFJ disc repair machine have two grits