Reflecto-lite tails

[bMOREreclaimed]

Recently upgraded my Reflecto-lite 1400 tails.  I was cutting people off all the way across America without a left blinker.  After much research and disappointment I can't just buy a new set, I rebuilt the existing. Overall I am very pleased, expensive, but worth it.  My approach is a bit different from others I've seen, so I figured I would pay my forum dues.

A lot of people use plastic for a frame, but this seems cheap to me; I went with Aluminum.  Also, I wanted to maintain the factory look as the rarity of the part speaks to its importance.

 

Disconnecting from the truck, I added male/female spade connectors to each lead for future repairs, added 4 new L-base bulb sockets (2 each side), wired the reverse to trigger both filaments, red LED bulbs for brake, white LED for back-up and Standard bulb for blinker(the idea of using resistors is concerning to me)

 

Cleaning everything up I painted the taillight fronts, super-glued a few bad cracks, applied butyl tape and applied my vanity cover.  An Aluminum rectangle ($110) was then prepped, primed and painted to match.  This 1/8thick aluminum is plenty strong to pull my cracked and warped frames tight to the truck.  New stainless screws painted to match (only 6 per light) and I'm down the road.

 

If I was to do it over, I would of used thicker butyl tape, (1/4") and next size up stainless screws (#10?) as some of the holes were stripped.  

 

I've included a pdf of my vanity cover template.  This was emailed directly to Metal Supermarkets(national chain) and I stopped by a few days later to pick up.  Fit PERFECTLY.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Tailight.pdf