Custom Tail Lights

First off, I would just like to encourage you with this: “These are easier to make than most may think.”

I do things much like a lot of us on here do, on a BUDGET. All the stuff I used to make them, almost anyone can get for like $30-50. As for tools, I mainly used a rotary tool (dremel) to take care of business, but I also used a SawzAll to cut the trunk space where the new taillights mount--not totally necessary. You may not need this if you are using LED type lights—not certain though.

Materials you will need:
• Stock Tercel taillight housing and taillight harness (wires with sockets for the bulbs)
• 4 – 4 to 4.25” red round trailer light lenses or flat LED type trailer lights (make sure dual function)—eBay
• Two cheap Eveready flashlights or whatever you want to use for your reverse lights—Walmart
• 4 - 4” PVC couplings for home plumbing (or whatever size you may need for your light/lens) I just take the lens in and drop them in different PVC piping material until I find a fit—HomeDepot
• Two 1157 pigtails (socket for 1157 bulb)
• 4 – 1157 Bulbs
• 2 – 194 Bulbs (if using the flashlight technique)
• Body Filler
• Gorilla Glue
• 1 rattle can fake chrome paint (for those using stock incandescent bulbs)
• Masking tape
• Solder
• Sandpaper
o 1 sheet of each: 60, 100, 220, 400 grit
• Small roll 3/8”wide by ¼” thick weather stripping
• 2 – self tapping screws

Tools you will need:
• Rotary tool (dremel)
o Tips: Reinforced cutting disk, drill bit type cutter (actual drill bit will work also just slower), and 1/2” sanding drum 80 grit
• Soldering iron for wiring
• Sawzall and/or metal snips
• Tool set with miscellaneous basic tools—screwdrivers, pliers, ratchet set, etc.

Here's some pics  of materials to help.

4" PVC couplings to house the lenses.

4" round red trailer lens.

1157 bulb socket with pigtails.

Flashlight for reverse lights.

Self expanding glue that foams/bubbles and dries hard.

Chrome spray paint used for reflective purposes inside lights.

Let’s get started!

Step 1: Disconnect and remove stock taillight wiring harness from taillight housing. Work on housing over cardboard or something of the sort because debris and glue will get everywhere.

Step 2: Place housing, lens side down, and with the dremel cut out the back where the blinker bulb is mounted and then the back where the brake light is mounted. I switched back and forth between the drill bit and disk cutter to make these cuts.

Depending on what type of reverse light you are using you will need to cut that out to fit that in also. When doing this part you want to leave the one built in bolt on the housing that’s on the upper section of the reverse light backing. Also save the brake light cutouts we will reuse them.

Step 3: Now flip housing back over—lens side up. Now you need to cut holes in the lenses to fit the PVC couplings that will house your new round lenses. Place the PVC couplings on top of lens so you can trace them out. You can place them the way you want them but you are pretty limited in space. You need to keep the two circle cutouts within the borders of the two backing cutouts. It helps to cut out the circle so that the PVC fits snug.

I forgot to take a picture to illustrate this step. But here’s one that should do fine. Also keep at least one of the cut outs from this. I reused one from each light as backing, where the bulb mounts into.

Step 4: Place the PVC couplings so that they are pretty much flush with the outside lens and use a few pieces of masking tape to help hold them in place. You don’t need to get them perfectly flush because you will just grind off the excess later.

Now with the PVC in place turn the housing lens side down and glue. You might find that it’s hard to get the glue bottle down to where the PVC meets the lens. No problem! What you want to do is let the glue run down, say, the bottom 1/3 of the PVC so that it runs down the PVC and onto the housing. Be sure to get glue all around where the PVC meets the lens. This stuff expands a bit so don’t get to crazy. But at the same time be generous. I used a half bottle by the time I was done with everything.

Here is another one of what it should look like from the front with the masking tape holding the PVC in place.

Step 5: Now you’ll need to make some backing to where the bulbs/sockets will mount. That’s why we saved those two pieces—the remnants. You should have saved one round lens cutout and one brake light backing cutout (with hole already to mount bulb) from each taillight. You need to cut out a hole for your second 1157 socket/pigtail. For this I traced the socket on the round lens cutout before I cut, but it came out kind of rough. However, it still mounted firmly.

Now you need to cut out the brake light backing remnant to the shape and size of the PVC—the lens cutout should fit fine as long as you didn’t hack it up. With the housing face down put just a little bit of the gorilla glue all along the lip of the PVC to where we will mount the backing. Now place the backing cutouts on the PVC then glue all around the seam where the PVC and cutouts meet. Glue dripping down the outside is good but try not to let it drip inside the PVC. You’ll find that the cutouts don’t sit flat. Just try your best to tape down the edges of the cutouts so that they are touching or close to touching the PVC.

At this point we have to stop and give time to let the glue fully cure. Best to let it sit overnight.

Step 6: Rise and shine! Check out the situation. The glue should have expanded and hardened. You can take off the all the masking tape. Now it’s time to test the body and fender skills. First, place the housing lens side up. Get you dremel with the 80 grit sanding drum to grind down the PVC so that it’s flush or even a tad bit in from the housing/lens surface.

Now wipe down the lens side of the housing with prep solvent or watered down alcohol. Let it air dry then sand down the entire lens side of the housing with some 180-240 sandpaper to give the body filler something to adhere to. I like to cover nearly all the light. Make sure to catch the splits between lenses and especially around the PVC and mating surfaces.

Almost done, now you need to sand it. I like to sand it with a rough grit like 60 when it is still a little soft just to get the initial shape and to work out the large lap marks and stuff. Then I step down to 100 grit and work that for a little while and then down to like 220. It may start to look pretty good but you may need to put on another coat or two of body filler and keep on with the sanding process. Kind of like where I am at, in this picture.

Step 7: After you get it all nice to where you are like “Yeaaaahhhhhh”—making 320-400 grit your last stage of sanding the body filler. Then you prime it so that you can really say “oh yeah”—or “oh no.” When that’s dried up then you sand the primer with 400 sandpaper—wet sanding is good—and paint your final color of choice perhaps using a clear coat too. Before you paint the final color spray the inside bottom half and backing with the fake chrome to give it its reflective properties—not sure if it’s really necessary. Let it all dry thoroughly.

Step 8: Now you are going to mount the new round lenses into the PVC from the front. If you went with the PVC couplers that I did then they stop the lens perfect. If not then you’ll have to figure out how far you want the lens to be recessed. Not to deep because the bulb gets hot. To do this just dab a very small amount of the Gorilla glue either on the lip of the lens that will rest against the lip in the middle of the PVC coupler or you can dab glue on the lip of the coupler itself. You don’t want to use too much glue here because we don’t want it expanding and oozing out of the front and around the round lens. I placed glass cups on the round lenses to keep them snug to the coupler lip while the glue dried.

To assist in your wiring efforts. Note: In this diagram, wire colors are not actual harness colors. 

STOCK WIRING: 

Green--------------------->Parking/Running

Green/White-------------->Brake

Green/Yellow------------>Blinker/Turn

Red/Blue------------------>Reverse

Black/White--------------->Ground

And here is the finished product.

I am currently in the process of putting togetther a set of these but with LED's. By going with LED's it appears that the depth of the housing should remain around the same as stock therefore there should be no need to cut out the car body where the tailights sit in. Edit: DONE (SEE BELOW)

Here is what I mean with the cut out of the body to fit the new lights.

Update: Now for the LED version.

As of right now these particular 4" round LED lights aren't able to function the way I had intended them. However, I have a new set on the way, but this update is mainly to show the difference in functionality, size and appeal.

The (4) 4" round fixtures have 10 Light-Emitting Diodes (LED's) per fixture and the little clear 2" reverse lights have 24 LED's per 1156 type auto lighting fixture--as opposed to the 194 incandescent bulb I used in the 1st set these shine. 

Here's an up close of the reverse LED light fixture.

Finished!

As you can see in this view of the backside, I have used al the same mounting material--still PVC couplings for the 4" lights and flashlight tops for the reverse lights.

Good News: As I suspected the 4" lights allow for  the housing to be much narrow than the incandescent lights (1st set of taillights). This leaves these new taillights much closer in depth to the stock taillights. 

Therefore, it is likely this new setup can fit without any cutting out of the car's body. I say "likely" because I never really tested it since my car's body had already been modified to accomodate the previous set.

If you have any questions you can PM me anytime. I'd be more than happy to help. Have fun!