K guys i was a little nervous at first im not gunna lie but i got a nice heat gun from my neighbor and a dremmel from my dad and went down to home depot and picked up some florescent light cover for $4.15!!! a sheet only got one sheet so any took about six hours all together taking out the lights getting them apart and dremmeling the lens but i think it came out perfect in my eyes i did both the outside and the inside lenses so that everything matched up and it looked cleaner im very happy with the turn out rather then spending $150 at custommaxima.

Let me know what you guys think id like to hear some feed back on how good or bad of a job you think i did.

 

pics dont work... try hosting them on cardomain

 

k fixed the pics try it now

 

you suck at the internet




they turned out nice, very impressed

 

haha thanks jesse lol

 

feed back?

 

looks good, great job on doing all 4. I did the outers and have never gotten around to doing the inners..

 

they look very nice. Feels good when you do them on your own doesn't it?

 

Tomservo so woth doing the insides it only took me a total of about 2 hours and that was because i had to reglue the rubber around the lense back on cause it pop'd off and had to wait for it to dry but i would deff recommend doing the inside to looks so much better when they match up and i very much do agree that you feel more satisfaction out of making them yourself rather then buying them for crazy amounts of money rather easy mod just time consuming worth the time if you have nothing else to do and your bored or if the ambers are really ****ing you off which it was both in my case i hate amber color plus i was bored haha had a couple of hours to kill

 

OMG!!!! You've done it! You now need to duplicate them at least 40 times and you my friend will be a rich, rich man! If you need an investor or another set of tails to try this on let me know!!!! I love them and the pictures are worth 1000 words! Good job!!

 

Looks like they turned out great.

 

Great job buddy! Wish I could do that with my I30 tails. I am still too scared, but I am thinking the heat gun is the way to go for melting the glue huh? Great job!

 

Bro. Looks awesome. I did mine but i had a time constraint because once I took them out of the oven, I got a call to hit the bars. Did them in 1.5 hours and kinda said 'fukkit' , So I melted the edges of one of my tails, so its a little curled up, and the edges of my plastic pieces are rigid cuz I used a mini pocket razor to cut it. It worked well and accurate cuz I used a ruler, but a larger box cutter wouldve been splendid. again. Great job and if only mine had turned out half as nice.

 

good job......now wash it!

 

thanx alot for the feed bacj guys i was thinking of starting to do it for the org members still thinking about if i wanna and how much i should charge let me know what you think is a good price

 

Great work, looks really good!

 

For me, you should do it for $10!!! LOL Since I am your first paying customer and all.

Anyway, if you do end up doing it for org. members, please let me know how much I may take you up on it.

 

I love the '95/'96 owners on this thread going nuts thinking they can do this to their cars too.

for the newer members: these DIY red/clears are 97-99 only.

 

mchne: That is not because of what I said is it? Just curious, cause I have a 96 Infiniti I30 and it can be done to my rear tails.

Just curious, not biggie.

 

it looks awesome man..

 

looks good. one day at the carwash i realized mine didn't match. The ones from custom maxima were dark red (around the edge) and my inners were a lighter shade of red. So i opened the old lights and new ones put the old cover on the new base and now they're perfect. The good thing about it the custom maxima light had the same plastic as the orange original so i dont have to do the inners.(or am i reaching for a good side, paying $150 for a $10 mod?)

 

neato.

I chose the DTM route because I couldnt cut that crap for the life of me.

Nice work all you DIYers!

 

Looking great man.

 

I found 3 diy instructions, but still am nervous to try this any advice on this conversion you can give? Some do's or dont's? Thanks in advance.

 

only advise is TAKE YOUR TIME WITH THE HEAT GUN PART and open it slowly and dont hold the heat gun in one spot for to long the rest should be easy the only real part i was nervous about was taking apart the lens then putting it back together tight a air tight so it wouldnt get water in there and fog up but it washed it after and then it just rained to day and still no fog so i doubt it will ever for up i siliconed it pritty good on top of the original glue that i heated back up after i put the lens back together

 

dude don't worry. I had all 3 sets of instructions. What it comes down to is being patient and not forcing anything. The taillight should coem off easily with the right amount of heat. Everything must be done with care, but not too much or it'll take you forever. I didd the oven method. 10 minutes at 250 degrees. I'll tell you it was like sliming gum off my shoe. Only thing with the oven method is that it gets really hott and to remember not to have any edges pressing down (ie. colored part of lense housing should be pointing downwards) I kinda melted mine, youll know what i mean.

GOOD LUCK!. the mentality is, if i F this up, I can always get gen2 altezzas

 

I tried the oven method and warped my lens. I definitely recommend using a heat gun, and definitely be PATIENT. It was easy to do after I messed up the first one because then I knew where the glue was and exactly where to heat the black housing. Another thing is to watch out for the black stuff that holds the whole light to the car. It gets everywhere (but it does just rub off fairly easily).

When cutting the fluorescent light, the dremel is the only way to go. I cut out a template on paper and taped it to the panel, then dremeling took 2 minutes. You should probably making it slightly larger than the template so that it will fit snuggly into the lens. I also used the heat gun to give the cut panel a little curvature before fitting it in.

Putting back together is pretty easy. Just fit the two together and heat. As the glue melts you can slowly push the two parts back together. The first light I did took about 45min - 1 hr. The second light took 20 minutes

Once you do it once it'll be easy.

Edit: One more thing. After I screwed up the first time, I was able to find a stock replacement for about $35 on eBay. I wasn't gonna go through with the mod, but I went for it anyway. I think that even if you screw up, buying a cheap $25 - $30 replacement light is better than buying $100 altezzas....and if you have a white maxima like me, it looks ridicously good.

 

looks good man. I never got around to doing the inner part of the tails but its still ok. I wanna get the DTM mod done to it sooner or later. Looks good. Now just drop that thing.

 

they look awesome!. good job

 

a clean job. nicely done!

 

congradualtions looks good i got to stop being lazy and clear the inside tails

 

I've got some great advice, DONT USE A HEAT GUN.

It works, but its much more risky... if you screwup and hold it over one spot for just a second or two too long and you've just permanently ****ed up your lights.

Use an oven. Look for previous threads for heat/time instructions ... this is how I did it, they come apart easy and no need to worry about melting them if instructions are followed properly.

I *THINK* it was 200F for 10-12 minutes, BUT DONT QUOTE ME ON THAT ... look at previous threads (i think search has been enabled again?)

 

Heatgun has worked for me great the past few times. I've never had a problem with it

 

I've noticed that you guys took out the red side marker light when you cleared out the amber. Just wondering why? Don't you guys get busted for that omission?

 

nah, didn't mean you.

 

Anyone try the 95-96 Red/Clear/Altezza taillight mod yet ???

95-96 backhousing>>>Altezza Outer piece>>>top is fitted with acrylic material>>>bottom is spray painted red.

 

Blackcat, regarding the red piece, I took mine out completely and now have led's in its place. It lights up the housing just a bit and it looks nice. I dont know if its illegal, I highly doubt it

 

thanx for the compliments guys much appreciated

 

I used the heat gun and I thought that was safer than the oven, they came out great. I also used a a very sharp tip soldering iron to cut the patterns and filed them to make them smoother. Thanks to my dad for the idea.

 

with BlackCat:
I think I would have left the little red piece that is beside the amber stock tail when I cleared out. Maybe I just like the way that looks on the side.