Coolest tail lights in the World...might be a bit biased

As far as legality, the 3x5s are legal. They were designed as a 3 wire stop/turn/park system. I've just got them hooked up as stop/park light. I haven't checked the yellow turn signal lights yet. I originally had a single LED 2.5" round in there, but it was way too dim. The 13 LED version is pretty bright, so I'm sure it meets the DOT lumens requirement. I haven't had the opportunity to drive behind myself lately, but I'm told their plenty bright and cut through the fog we're under right now.
I'm sure I could have done better with the back-ups, but I was totally going for function over form there, and my requirements were for bright light behind me in a somewhat protected form. I couldn't make them fit countersunk into my rear bumper the way I wanted due to the way I designed it, and below is out of the question, and you can't put anything on the top of the bumper. Lights on top of the vehicle look cool in a parking but wouldn't survive the forests I wheel in, so I figured this was a failrly decent compromise. The only other thing I've seen that would work and not look too dumb is a guy who countersunk some flush lights into the tailgate.
-kelly
 
Those are hands down the best looking 'aftermarket' corner lights I've ever seen. I typically don't like the aftermarket stuff at all, but I would actually be willing to look at those on my XJ everyday!
 
So seriously, if I were to get these together in the USD$250-275 range with LEDs, would I be wasting my time? How many would actually be willing to pony up? I'm going to see if I can come up with something similar for the pre 96s too.
-kel
 
i think if you could get them in the $100-$150 US dollar range, a lot of people would jump on them, including me, but for $250-$275, i would buy a skidplate or something. Just my .02 worth, but i do think they look sweet!
 
Just to play Devil's Advocate...

Any reason you went with ABS instead of sheetmetal?

How about, say, aluminum vice steel for the housing?

Can the projector beam reverse light be changed out for a compact flood - and can a cornering or working light (white semi-flood) be installed alongside?

Have you checked the LED bulbs with electronic flashers? Most of the time, they don't care what resistances are connected (unlike the old "thermal" or "RC Tank" flashers. Tridon EL-12 comes to mind - for about $10 each.)

Any possibility of getting them to fit the earlier body XJ's (pre 1996?) It's a sharper bend up there in the corner than you've got.

How "plug-and-play" are they - do you have to chop out the old sockets and splice, or have you worked out a cleaner approach?

Water seal - what have you done to keep water splash out from behind the light assemblies? Failing that, how are you draining the rear quarter panel?

I'd honestly think that going with a floodlight for the reverse light rather than an LED would be more practical - they don't see as much use, and when you need them, you REALLY need them! Just a thought...

Just a batch of thoughts - I'm sure I'll come up with more. Make these good, and I've probably found a batch of rear lights to use on my restomods...

5-90
 
Those last 2 post have some good advice. And i agree with the $100-$150 price range. I would definitly try to fit in a traditional flood lamp for the reverse, and maybe there are a few other things you can do to cut production cost?

Those look awesome though, best tail lights I've seen!
 
noresttill said:
Would those taillights be street legal? (Im mostly interested in US street legality, but I think its the same in Canada)
Click to expand...

some states require side markers front and rear (factory takes that into consideration). a simple fix on these would be to put a smaller led on the side wired to the park light circut.
 
Thanks for the feedback. To address some of the questions:

ABS-sorry for the confusion. They're all steel construction, the piece of 1.25" ABS pipe happened to be about the radius I needed to bend the steel around to form the one corner to the curve of the tailgate.

The projector fogs are incandecent, not LEDs, 55w a piece, so they're somewhat brighter than the stock lenses. I used what I had kicking around which happened to be these cheepos. The beam turned out to be wide and focused a little flatter than I had been hoping for, but they sure light it up behind me. There's not a whole lot of room there, otherwise a pair of 3" or 4" floods would have been my first choice. I'm sure there's other lights out there that would do an even better job.

Flasher- Putting in the LEDs made my stock flasher go crazy. I simply replaced it with an EP27 electronic flasher and all is just fine.

Earlier years- I looked at my buddy's 87 today and these probably will look terrible on it, unless I change the design to follow the older body lines. Stay tuned...

Plug & Play- Not. Not yet at least. I was getting excited about the lights and didn't feel like taking the time to pull the interior apart to get back to the wiring harness, so I just chopped, soldered, liquid taped and heat shrunk. A lot of work to be sure, but I wanted to play around a bit with different wirings, and this allowed me to test various ways out. I'm sure I can come up with harnesses that just plug into the stock connector.

Sealing- The boxes themselves are quite open. In my experience with rain and water (and out here (BC) we get plenty of opportunity to test), water is going to get in, you better provide good means for it to get out. The LED light units themselves are sealed units, and use a somewhat standard type of grease filled connector which seals up good enough for immersion (like on a boat trailer). These are what they use on commercial trailers which are all open in behind and get caked with all manner of grime, mud and various liquids.
In my case, I cut the bulbs off, and didn't remove or tamper with the stock grommet/seal where the wires came out of the body. Therefore, the integrety is as good as the stock installation was.

Side lighting- I was concerned with this when I designed the lights and did a couple things on account of this. I really didn't want a light on the side because where I wheel, you're taking a lot of brush down the side of the vehicle, that's what took out my stock light in the first place.
The actual LED light units themselves which I used stick out the back a fair bit. The bulk of the body is countersunk, but the actual lens sticks out by a good 1/2" in the case of the red stop/park lights, and around 1/4" to 3/8" for the yellow signal. To keep these protected I set them back into the body, and angled them about 15 degrees outboard. Between the amount that they protrude from flush, and the amount that they're angled, They are fairly visable from 90 degrees. If I were to make more of these, I would increase the angle to make them even more visable from the side. I haven't check the motor vehicle regs for specs on this, but in a practical sense, at the very least the intent of the law is fulfilled. If they're going to get really sticky, a reflector could probably be taken care of with a piece conspicuosity tape, I'm guessing. A stick on reflector could be put on, but wouldn't last for me, and both would look retarded, imho.

As for the price, I'm not sure I could do it for $150. The lights themselves came to about that in canadian dollars. If I can get lights for wholesale, I might be able to make something work.

Any more questions? Keep the feedback coming.
 
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i think they are very awesome!
I believe 200 is a fair price...
you might consider fabbing the housings alone too and then point people to where they can get lights for themselves..
maybe even different lights....but i like the ones you have mounted best.

seriously nice, 200 if you have to but, consider the housings alone for the other guys.... 225 is fair at least that is what i would pay....

please let us know if you do makem...

aaron
 
Oh and i forgot... a side marker !!!
 
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