schrute's journal

schrute

The tail lights look better without the egg yolks, now they need some tint! I ordered some spray tint and clear coat from Amazon.



Nissan didn't make it easy to get to the taillights!



First step, clean the lenses with alcohol.



I chose to leave the clear part of the lens untinted. I used some pinstripe tape to outline the clear part of the lens.



Then some painters tape to finish masking the clear part.



Some more painters tape and newspaper to protect the back part of the tail light from overspray.



First coat.



Almost forgot the third brake light, lol. This thing was rediculous to remove. I don't want to do that again. First coat.



Second coat on the tail lights. This pic was taken with a flash so the red shows through the tint more in the pic than it does in person.



One coat of clear coat then.... Oh yeah!



You can still see the brake lights just fine (I didn't want to reduce visibility from the rear so I only used two coats).



LED reverse lights from v-leds.com.



The chrome coated turn signal bulbs seem plenty bright.



I'll get some better pics in the daylight.

The headlights are screaming to get blacked out now. It never ends!

UPDATE: a couple days later I was checking out the lights up close for the first time and realized that the edge of the tint where the clear part was masked has kind of an edge to it. Down the road that edge can catch on something maybe and start peeling the tint. So I added another two coats of clear just to give some peace of mind about that edge. If I had it to do over I would remove the masking after spraying the tint then add two coats of clear, sealing that edge right away.

UPDATE #2: the finish was a little rough so I used a small amount of rubbing compound to smooth things out. The look of the lights didn't change but they're now a bit smoother which should attract less dirt and clean off easier.

I also got a better pic

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