Got fed up with the yellowing of my taillights so I went ahead and pryed them open and took them completely apart (well one was starting to fall apart - the silicone didn't hold very well/long after I repainted the insides). A day of pain in my fingertips and some rubbing compound, look at the difference it made :grinno:
I was surprised how easy it actually was to separate everything from the clear outer shell. The picture doesn't do it justice
Wow! that is good looking. you should post some before and after pics.
what? on the car? Don't have a before of the rear end.
...the picture is after on the left and before on the right. I'll get a rear picture tomorrow morning
oh, well either way looks better then mine.
Yea its suprizing what a good clean up will do... I had one fairly nice one and the other a little weathered on my Bird. I dissambled the weathered one and gave it a good clean and polish. Now it looks a lot better than the decent one.
I need to do that, my reverse lights are about as bad as my headlights (as in light;the headlights are clear as day, no yellow)
Another thing to brighten up your tail lights while they are apart, is to repaint the reflector with chrome paint. Really brightens them up. :ies:
Wouldn't it be more effective to sand and polish the reflectors since they're metal?
Mine were plastic. :dunno:
mine too.
Mine have all been plastic. There is a reflective coating on 'em from the factory, but it usually fades and corrodes from age and moisture.
hmmm...mine feels like aluminum but guess it could be a coating. Hasn't faded at all if it is. I'll go get that picture now...spent the last 5 hours locked outside (went to go back to a body shop to turn in a job application but once I closed the house door, realized my keys were still inside). Gotta love 35 degree weather with a 50mph wind. At least it didn't rain :wtf:
(http://home.comcast.net/~s.g.s/tbird/rear.jpg)
that's :ies: !
Another thing u can do cougarman is to take apart the lens itself check out http://www.coolcats.net/stockmod/modified/taillights.html for a really cool mod. I did it to my 88 blue max now the lenses are clear and really sweet. Took about an hour minus cleaning.
I'd try any painting on spares...when I repainted the insides of mine black, the plastic began to crack (still no idea why). Can see it in the upper left and right areas (one was SLIGHTLY cracked before the paint and now they're about ready to break off)
Yea, I seen that. I'm not real big on the whole "clear" light thing. :)
At least they're clear-red and not clear with chrome reflectors.
Yes that's good. :) They look good, just not my style :grinno: