Tail Gate Lights

[mararmeisto]

So at the risk of sounding naive... how would you be able to change the colour of on of the sides... do you need a different colour fiber optics? or just a different colour lens? (I haven't taken anything apart, but was just curious).

Josh

As you can see from this image from my other post (the one where I detail how I changed the light bar from fibre optic to LEDs), there are four parts to the light bar:

1-the plastic housing (the grey bar in the background)
2-the fibre optic strands (the white stripe, which is actually thin tape holding the strands together in a flat arrangement)
3-the green lens which goes between the strands and the letter bar
4-the letter bar which has half the word on each side (the letters are clear plastic with a metallic finish - a kind of one-way mirror finish)

In%20order.jpg (21.69 KiB) Viewed 3970 times

In order to change the color of the letters, one could change the color of the bulb, but there would still be a faint green-ness to the the illuminated letters. Or, one could do what I did in this post Can you see me now? and take the whole thing apart to change it to something a little more dramatic. Like this:

Lit.jpg (19.52 KiB) Viewed 3971 times

As I said in the above post, taking apart the light bar is not for the faint of heart because the two pieces of plastic are glued together with some incredibly persistent glue that I was only able to take apart with a heat gun and time.

[josh]

As you can see from this image from my other post (the one where I detail how I changed the light bar from fibre optic to LEDs), there are four parts to the light bar:

1-the plastic housing (the grey bar in the background)
2-the fibre optic strands (the white stripe, which is actually thin tape holding the strands together in a flat arrangement)
3-the green lens which goes between the strands and the letter bar
4-the letter bar which has half the word on each side (the letters are clear plastic with a metallic finish - a kind of one-way mirror finish)

In%20order.jpg

In order to change the color of the letters, one could change the color of the bulb, but there would still be a faint green-ness to the the illuminated letters. Or, one could do what I did in this post Can you see me now? and take the whole thing apart to change it to something a little more dramatic. Like this:

Lit.jpg

As I said in the above post, taking apart the light bar is not for the faint of heart because the two pieces of plastic are glued together with some incredibly persistent glue that I was only able to take apart with a heat gun and time.

J. Paul,

Thanks for the extremely polite and patient response to my question. It was a classic blunder on my part to not look around for the other posts. Now that you pointed it all out I do remember that post and those pictures. Thanks the pointers. Cheers

Josh

[torchard]

So I did the fix last night. Had a hellava time getting the solder to take to the bulb leads. Sad to say I eventually pretty much wound them all tight together and sunk it into the base with copious amounts of boot goop (couldn't find any proper silicone etc around the house). Gave the bulbs a wipe with my daughter's alcohol-based pimple pads, let it all dry and they were good to go this morning. I popped them in on the way to work, but was disappointed at what little glow they seems to give off. The bulbs themselves are glowing brightly and the fibre optic strands seems intact yet not much glow. Bummer. Thoughts?

--T

[mararmeisto]

...but was disappointed at what little glow they seems to give off. The bulbs themselves are glowing brightly and the fibre optic strands seems intact yet not much glow. Bummer. Thoughts?

--T

The green glow is difficult to see in the sunlight. It's a very subtle illumination which is best seen at night; and even then it such that some on this forum only saw it after having owned their vans for a number of months!

[torchard]

Thanks. There I go again expecting big things. All that pimple medication and shoe goop for little gain. Such is life.

--T

The green glow is difficult to see in the sunlight. It's a very subtle illumination which is best seen at night; and even then it such that some on this forum only saw it after having owned their vans for a number of months!

[zissou]

You have inspired me. I pulled off the tailgate cover and it turns out that my van too is wired for the light up 'delica'.... well sort of..... The blown out bulbs are there and once upon a time there must have been wiring.

I'll go shopping after work and pick up some bulbs, boot goop and pimple meds...

Thanks for the inspiration.

Cheers
Steve

[torchard]

Enjoy! I was thinking - after the fact - that a better option would be to install a proper bulb and socket (BA9?) instead of those capless bulbs. You might then goop bulb and base into the reflector thingy or hold it all in place with shrink tubing. Luv shrink tubing!

[dfnder]

I was thinking that of an option to change the color of the lighted back. This is a question for those that have taken the whole assembly appart, would it be feasible/work to change out the greenish filter and insert a differant color filter media?

[mararmeisto]

I was thinking that of an option to change the color of the lighted back. This is a question for those that have taken the whole assembly appart, would it be feasible/work to change out the greenish filter and insert a differant color filter media?

The two parts of the lens are glued together with a real nasty (read: super sticky) glue that I was only able to take apart with a heat gun.

That being said, the colour is dependent only on a single strip of coloured plastic. So if you changed the plastic strip - different colour. I've since unplugged the lights because the LEDs were too focused.