My tailight project - CEG Archives

Originally posted by auiotour:

Originally posted by Chris Hightower:
Don't try this on a 98+ Contour tail light. I can assure you there is NO clear lens under the red part. At least for the Contour.

hmmm i know you are one to know your stuff, but I should take a picture of the busted tail light down at the junk yard I saw a few weeks ago (if the car is still there) Anyways it had a clear lense inside of it. and it was a post97

Well, all the ones I hacked on, didn't have clear under them. And, I have hacked on quite a few

I like 'em.

Doesn't look that bad to me.

I think it looks nice on a white car only. Clean up the rest of the red lens and I think it will look great!!!

Get two of those 4" round truck LED's and try to find some smaller 3" round Orange LED's then mount them inside, with the smaller orange on slightly behind and to the outside of the red one. Then wire the red one to the third brake light, and parking lights. Wire the orange one to the front turn signals....

At least that's what I'd do, in a flash I would......

They aren't Bad. But I'd as you said get rid of the rest of the Red or Black them out and smoke the lenses to match the reverse lights look.

Good job trying.

wonder how those would look on a black car?? hmmmmmmmmmm

Youll get pull over as soon as you hit the road.

-dan

me or him??

amarv12

i have also cut up my share of contour tails, and i have yet to find a clear lens under the red......more power to you man

i lve to see a new idea come to life wheather i like it or not......

i do agree you should smoke the clear tho.

Thanks for all the comments/suggestions so far, i appreciate it!

Originally posted by BaBySHO:
Same.

If ur gonna go clear, go with a carbon fiber back ground.

But if i did something like this, i would have to make a fully clear lense, without the fluting and stuff. This would work out best, except, i'm not too sure that i could match the curvature myself...then it would just look like crap. Otherwise that way would be ideal, i cold incorporate a few lamps and a red reflector.

Originally posted by Plastique_synthetiX:
Get two of those 4" round truck LED's and try to find some smaller 3" round Orange LED's then mount them inside, with the smaller orange on slightly behind and to the outside of the red one. Then wire the red one to the third brake light, and parking lights. Wire the orange one to the front turn signals....

At least that's what I'd do, in a flash I would......

Hmmm, that sounds pretty good. But i wonder if it would look good with the fluting in the lense (mixing the two colors, that is). I think i'll stick with just red for now, i could always mod it more later...

Originally posted by Cris'pus:
They aren't Bad. But I'd as you said get rid of the rest of the Red or Black them out and smoke the lenses to match the reverse lights look.
Good job trying.

"Good job trying"...lol, thanks. Ya, I was thinking about smoking them, as well as putting either a white or balck stripe horizontally across the center.

Originally posted by gearhead98:
wonder how those would look on a black car?? hmmmmmmmmmm

Something like this:

This image belongs to another CEG'r, i believe her name was lil'SVTless or something....looks pretty cool, dunno if its real or not.

Originally posted by MYCONTOURSVT05:
Youll get pull over as soon as you hit the road.

-dan

THe clear lense has built in reflectors, i believe all i need to stay legal is some red reflectors, and i've been thinking about mounting some low on the bumper...
I know they aren't "DOT approved," but a lot of things on my car aren't "approved"....oh well, i'm aware of the legal consequences.

Originally posted by amarv12:
"

That looks nice on a black tour too.

yup it sure does, i may have to go and try this with mystique lights

Alright, some updated pics, one of the lamps got some bondo lovin', and i primered them both.

In this pic you can see that the reflector portion is still present:

More angles:

I'm still not sure which color i want to paint the primered part, its either black, or body color. I'm leaning towards black at the moment... should provide a nice contrast, then i could also possibly add a black strip of vinyl to the top of the reflector to match.....i dunno, so many options

yea you need more color back there, too much white IMO

if you're gonna leave em clear...gotta do the spoiler light too.

I like it, Just put a Red Led bulb back there and it should be fine

Originally posted by I-Dom-In-8:
I like it, Just put a Red Led bulb back there and it should be fine

my tailight project is on hold, because i simply have no time to work on them, plus the more i look at what i'm trying to do the less i like it. i'll post pics asap, lemme know what you think.

very nice work tho....gives me new ideas.

BTW-i got some 24 led bulbs from autoliminatuion.com and they are awesome and i think there just what you need, check em out.

I think it looks great. Nice job.

looks "fabolous" nice work!

Wow... I think it looks great... I got a white mystique also... waiting to see how this turns out and I might end up doing it as well. Do you think the reflector as a clear lens too? how did lilSVT do his?

lol... sorry, I'm a fan of clear lights........

no.... no.... stop throwing stuff at me!!! AAAAHHHHHH!!!!!

Thanks for the kind words, guys.

Originally posted by pole120:
my tailight project is on hold, because i simply have no time to work on them, plus the more i look at what i'm trying to do the less i like it. i'll post pics asap, lemme know what you think.

very nice work tho....gives me new ideas.

BTW-i got some 24 led bulbs from autoliminatuion.com and they are awesome and i think there just what you need, check em out.

Cool, feel free to toss some pics up, i dunno how much assistance i could provide, but it wouldn't hurt to look. Thanks for the link as well (i think the correct spelling is www.autolumination.com). And ya, my project is gonna have to go on hold too, the fall semester starts tuesday, which is gonna be crazy; then on top of that, i found out i have a "large" hernia, so i'm getting surgery next friday, then recovery time

Originally posted by Steve Benthal Jr.:
Wow... I think it looks great... I got a white mystique also... waiting to see how this turns out and I might end up doing it as well. Do you think the reflector has a clear lens too? how did lilSVT do his?

lol... sorry, I'm a fan of clear lights........

no.... no.... stop throwing stuff at me!!! AAAAHHHHHH!!!!!

I believe that the reflector has one as well, not sure though. If you look at it, it appears that there is another lense underneath the red...i guess you're gonna have to either risk hacking yours apart, or hit up a junkyard (much safer

).

Also, i have no clue how lil'SVT did hers or if its even real, i found that pic like 1.5 years ago, i don't even remeber how.

nice job, i love the way that looks. might have to try something like that when i get back.

Sorry for being dumb here guys but how do you get the red off the taillights of the early contour or mystique?

Originally posted by Steve Benthal Jr.:
Do you think the reflector as a clear lens too? how did lilSVT do his?

I'm wondering the same

First off, congrats on being ball-sy

I don't think it looks rice at all and this is coming from someone very picky on aestics (spelling

) and 34 years old! The one thing I'd do though is paint/tape the chrome strip that goes under the tailights black because it doesn't continue with the one thats under the center reflector and that disturbs the "flow" of the center reflector/tailights IMO. ***You MUST get a red LED bulb in that tailight*** The main reason the combo is illegal is because you don't have a red reflector back there, i.e. the center reflector is painted and theres NO red showing anywhere. I wonder what it would've looked like if you would've left some type of red shape in the center reflector

In closing it looks great on a white car and IMO, the only other color car this mod would look good on, is a silver Tour, good job once again and try and come on out to one of our meets sometime, we don't get any Mystiques out here.

I agree, i smashed one of my tail lights in a parking lot , and there was no clear lens underneath.

Originally posted by Chris Hightower:
Don't try this on a 98+ Contour tail light. I can assure you there is NO clear lens under the red part. At least for the Contour.

Originally posted by The Striped SVT:
First off, congrats on being ball-sy I don't think it looks rice at all and this is coming from someone very picky on aestics (spelling ) and 34 years old! The one thing I'd do though is paint/tape the chrome strip that goes under the tailights black because it doesn't continue with the one thats under the center reflector and that disturbs the "flow" of the center reflector/tailights IMO. ***You MUST get a red LED bulb in that tailight*** The main reason the combo is illegal is because you don't have a red reflector back there, i.e. the center reflector is painted and theres NO red showing anywhere. I wonder what it would've looked like if you would've left some type of red shape in the center reflector In closing it looks great on a white car and IMO, the only other color car this mod would look good on, is a silver Tour, good job once again and try and come on out to one of our meets sometime, we don't get any Mystiques out here.

Thanks.

As for the strip in the last set of pics i posted, it wasn't even on the lamps; i took it off to paint them...once i put it all together, it will be blacked out once again.

I also have ordered some red LED bulbs, and i just piced up a bunch of 10 watt resistors form radioshack in order to keep the correct blink-rate....so if the LED lamps are bright enough (and that's a big 'if') i should have the lighting taken care of.

And ya, i know, i gotta make it out to a meet one of these days...

I ended up painting the lamps black, and it looks like crap, they look way out of place.

They're not on the car right now...i guess i'll be painting them white in a few weeks.

how did you get the taillight apart. i wanna try it but instead of removing everything just removing a oval piece from the side and putting in an amber signal.

I removed the top lense using a dremel tool. I guess i'll go ahead and spill all the info since i'm such a friggin nice guy!

The two lenses are quite close together, on the reflector side of the lamp, there is approx. a 5mm gap between the lenses, then on the tapered end it drops down to about a 2.5mm gap. What this means is that when cutting, you need to be VERY VERY careful, use a steady hand, and work with lots of light. I used a conical metal bit with my rotary tool.

The clear lense is attached to the housing, however it is not sealed airtight. Silicone needs to be used along the perimeter, then fill with water to check for leaks.

Also, this plastic melts easily, basically it liquifies. So take lots of breaks when demeling, let the bit cool off and remove melted plastic from the bit often! The temps can get very high, to the point where the clear lense can melt as well, then some of the red bonds to the clear, removal is a b!tch.

I learned all this the hard way, if i had another chance, i bet i could do a MUCH better job, oh well.

***I take no responsibility for any harm done to anyone's car/parts/body, always follow suggested safety precautions!!!***

GL

How about the center on the contours, is there a clear part on those? Also are there any ideas on how to do the spoiler light?

I know that there is no clear layer under the center reflector, or at least for me because i can look in one end and look out the other, its just one big red reflector.

Amarv, I LED' the `00 lamps I am using. Instead of painting the circuit boards/OEM reflector black to smoke the lenses you could do white to further make them blend.

Otherwise, nice work. They look sharp on a white car.

To give you an idea on what I am talking about, follow these links: Clicky, Clicky

Unlike what this last link shows, they light up a very nice shade of red. Hit the brakes in the garage at night and you could read with the red glow they put off. Clicky

Originally posted by SVT Driver627:
I know that there is no clear layer under the center reflector, or at least for me because i can look in one end and look out the other, its just one big red reflector.

I had no clear layer under the `00 center reflector I got to keep me legal while mine was in for paint. There were no clear lenses inside my `00 tails either when I took them apart.

ExDelayed,

Actually, i don't think i'm gonna be opening the lights up completely....at least for the time being, so no circuit board LED's yet.

And, ya, i remember that you did your LED tails, i actually searched for that post in pics and vids this morning.

And i gotta say, i envy you and your one-hundred-and-however-many LEDs per lamp. I also looked at Josch's install, if i took the red lense off the Grote lamps, that might be an option as well.

Last week, I ended up ordering some 24 LED replacements for 1157 bulbs, 18 face forward, and 6 are pointed sideways. Right after i bought them, i found this website which basically tears all those bulbs apart.

So, i dunno at this point, might have to further hack the lights apart in the future.

I can imagine that with all those LEDs, your tails are probably bright as hell, nice work man.

amarv12, thanks for that link aboujt the LED car lights.. I am gonna use some of that with priviliages from the writer. thanks

Ya, that page is pretty cool, very informational.

I also found this sweet LED retrofit from an audi TT.

Wow bet he wished he paid about $0.80 less each if he would have known me, please would costed $1.20 for shipping instead of $5. lol

Originally posted by SVT Driver627:
I know that there is no clear layer under the center reflector, or at least for me because i can look in one end and look out the other, its just one big red reflector.

There is on a 95 mystique rear reflector, when I broke mine there was clear under it, I am not sure how far the clear goes though.

Originally posted by amarv12:
And, ya, i remember that you did your LED tails, i actually searched for that post in pics and vids this morning. And i gotta say, i envy you and your one-hundred-and-however-many LEDs per lamp. I also looked at Josch's install, if i took the red lense off the Grote lamps, that might be an option as well.

If you dig around that site a bit, you will find postings from Josch, Milan, myself and, IIRC, a few others from the CEG.

I believe when Josch did his, he just cut a hole in the back of the reflector and put the Grote into it. Since I wanted such a large number of LEDs, along with the tint job, I had to hack mine apart. It was a lot of work but it was well worth it.

does any one know how those grote lights wire up?

Originally posted by Daddy Phat Sacks:
does any one know how those grote lights wire up?

I was thinking/wondering that same thing.....

The same way ours do, since you need to look for an integrated stop/tail/turn, just like our cars come standard with (the dual contact bulb has everything in one bulb).

Three wires, just like your car has currently, a ground (black), turn signal (blue on 95 and 98 for sure), and regular lamp (can't remember wire color).

User: Josch used those, you can see pics in his webpage in his sig.

Originally posted by Daddy Phat Sacks:
does any one know how those grote lights wire up?

There is actually a small weatherproof connector that can be bought that plugs right into them. My project has them hardwired into the car.