Tail light brightness - gauging interest....

[surfin'02]

I have increased the visibility of my taillights on my '76 2002 by increasing the reflectiveness of the interior of my taillight assy.

I have done this for the taillamp, brakelamp and backup lamp. I have not done this for the turn signals. Attached are some pics after the work. You can clearly see a difference between the areas that have been upgraded, and the turnsignal area which has not

I was considering selling these to fellow forum members but, want to gauge the interest first. I was thinking of ~$50+shipping for the kit with instructions. Lots cheaper than new taillight shells or (worse) repairs from getting rear-ended because the person behind you could not see your brake lights!

Reply to this thread or email me at lberlemann@gmail.com if interested.

Thanks alot!!

[bnam]

I was just thinking about and working on brigthening the tail lamps this weekend. Looks like you are using some sort of metallized pastic fo he reflectors.

While that's real high reflectivity, I feel it is important to also maintain the elliptic curved reflector surface as flat reflectors disperse more widely and don't concentrate the light in the direction of the traffic following you. Do you have a similar solution for top/bottom surface or did you just paint?

I installed Bare Metal Foil - the Ultra Chrome version. It's a bit more painstaking, but it conforms well to the curved surfaces and holds up well (at least it has on my car over the past 6 months).

http://www.bare-metal.com/bare-metal-foil.html

2 sheets should be plenty for both square tails with some leftover for other areas like inside the speedo/tach etc.

Another thing I found is that the commonly used recommended bulb (#97) is half the wattage of the what was originally specified. Instead #5008 R10W 6CP is 50% brighter. There are 8-10CP bulbs avail, but they also seem to be shorter life (200hrs) which may be ok for some and not for

others.

Went outside and took some pics (SLR manual mode on tripod):

First with R5W on both sides. The right tail light was covered with BMF on the concave surfaces with BMF Chrome foil about 6mos ago. The left one I had not covered then, but did so last weekend on the concave and top & bottom surfaces with Ultra Chrome foils. It is a brighter than the right even when I switch the bulbs around. Will fix the right side soon.

Now with the Eiko R10W in the right tail (which is slightly less reflective)

Without lens -- R10W in left, R5W in right.

R10w in both

My conclusions -- R10W definitely the way to go. Not covering all surfaces does seem to impact reflectivity.

Byas

[surfin'02]

Wow! Nice job! Good job testing the different bulbs too!

Yes, I did put reflective material on the top & bottom, as well as the rear of the taillight assy.

I had before and after pictures, but, cannot locate them on my PC! I hate when that happens!

Thanks for your input!