MagnaV30
New Member
- Joined
- Jan 22, 2008
- Messages
- 223
- Reaction score
- 2
- Points
- 0
- Location
- Vancouver, British columbia, Canada
- Vehicle Year
- 1990
- Make / Model
- Ford
- Engine Size
- 2.9L
- Transmission
- Manual
Original Poster - MagnaV30
Difficulty - Its up there, 7/10, mostly patience.
Time for install - 10 - 16 hours / side
Disclaimer: The Ranger Station.com, The Ranger Station.com Staff, nor the original poster are responsible for you doing this modification to your vehicle. By doing this modification and following this how-to you, the installer, take full responsibility if anything is damaged or messed up. If you have questions, feel free to PM the original poster or ask in the appropriate section of The Ranger Station.com forums.
I had trouble finding anyone who had many aftermarket taillamp assemblys for my Ranger, and none that werent the "Euro style" of which I rather despise.
So, I decided to make my own.
I wanted OEM appearance, and LED draw, life, and responsiveness.
Tools required
- Soldering pencil
- Electric drill / 15 / 64" bit for 5mm LED's
- Hot melt glue gun
- Spray adhesive for trim panels
- Liquid electrical tape
- Zap Straps
- Micro torch / heat gun
- 4 prong trailer connector, PICO part # 1873 BP
- 1' of 6" OD ABS or PVC pipe
- Plastic weld epoxy
- Side cutters
- Needle nose pliers
- Dremel with various cutting / grinding bits
- Screwdriver / prybar
Parts needed
- High silver content solder
- Several hundred LED's
- Couple hundred resistors
- 3/16" dual wall heat shrink tubing
- 1/4" graph paper
Im warning you now, this project takes a fair bit of patience. If you dont think you can hack it, its best not to.
I ordered my LED's and resistors off of Ebay, 1000 LED's 500 resistors. You dont need all of these to complete the project, but I have other things planned for them. (front turn and mark )
I got 30mA 5mm bright white LED's rated at 13,000 millicandela and 180 ohm resistors with a tolerance of 5%.
I wired up the resistors in groups of 4, one resistor, with 4 LED's in series, then parallel with the rest of the LED's in each circuit.
This kept them stable in a 14V environment, without too much current to burn them out.
First thing was to remove the black plastic from the backside of the taillamp that held the Incandescent bulbs and their sockets.
You should end up with something like this
Take your plastic pipe, cut to the length of the lens, and then cut out a section to fit into it.
Cut notches to fit as required
Take 1/4 graph paper, and using your spray adhesive, secure to your pipe on the outside of the curvature.
Drill lots of holes.
I spaced them every other square, the length of the housing from top, to the bottom of the rear reflector.
I also opted to drill 12 holes to make a reverse lamp
Note in the pictures that these LED's are secured with hot melt glue, I found that when this cluster was ran for more than a few minutes, the LED's actually generated enough heat to make the glue tacky. I strongly suggest using the spray glue to secure your LED's into the housing, as I did for the rest of the project.
I did however find that the hot melt was more than adequate for securing wires.
Insert and glue your LED's.... Lots... and lots... of LED's...
128 for this section on mine...
Kinda looks like a porcupine huh?
Other side
Start soldering your circuits.
I made six rows as marker, 10 as stop / turn.
I started at the top with mark, then next two S/T, Mark, and repeated until the last row at the bottom was mark.
Even the woman got involved in this one
Everything lit, checking for any failures
With no failures, coat the exposed wires with liquid electrical tape, preferably a couple coats for good measure.
Wire up your pigtail for your disconnect (this is where that 4 prong trailer connector comes in, allowing you to take the lamp off if required)
Heat shrink these connections
Clean up your wires, and glue them down
Glue the ABS / PVC pipe into the lens, and allow to cure.
Now your ready to wire the other end of that trailer connector into the truck side of the lighting harness, and install your lamp.
Make sure to fold down the LED's near the edges of the housing (near the mount screw holes) as they might make contact with the truck when installed and cause you headaches....
Reverse
Marker
Stop / Turn
All
Video of light in action
Difficulty - Its up there, 7/10, mostly patience.
Time for install - 10 - 16 hours / side
Disclaimer: The Ranger Station.com, The Ranger Station.com Staff, nor the original poster are responsible for you doing this modification to your vehicle. By doing this modification and following this how-to you, the installer, take full responsibility if anything is damaged or messed up. If you have questions, feel free to PM the original poster or ask in the appropriate section of The Ranger Station.com forums.
I had trouble finding anyone who had many aftermarket taillamp assemblys for my Ranger, and none that werent the "Euro style" of which I rather despise.
So, I decided to make my own.
I wanted OEM appearance, and LED draw, life, and responsiveness.
Tools required
- Soldering pencil
- Electric drill / 15 / 64" bit for 5mm LED's
- Hot melt glue gun
- Spray adhesive for trim panels
- Liquid electrical tape
- Zap Straps
- Micro torch / heat gun
- 4 prong trailer connector, PICO part # 1873 BP
- 1' of 6" OD ABS or PVC pipe
- Plastic weld epoxy
- Side cutters
- Needle nose pliers
- Dremel with various cutting / grinding bits
- Screwdriver / prybar
Parts needed
- High silver content solder
- Several hundred LED's
- Couple hundred resistors
- 3/16" dual wall heat shrink tubing
- 1/4" graph paper
Im warning you now, this project takes a fair bit of patience. If you dont think you can hack it, its best not to.
I ordered my LED's and resistors off of Ebay, 1000 LED's 500 resistors. You dont need all of these to complete the project, but I have other things planned for them. (front turn and mark )
I got 30mA 5mm bright white LED's rated at 13,000 millicandela and 180 ohm resistors with a tolerance of 5%.
I wired up the resistors in groups of 4, one resistor, with 4 LED's in series, then parallel with the rest of the LED's in each circuit.
This kept them stable in a 14V environment, without too much current to burn them out.
First thing was to remove the black plastic from the backside of the taillamp that held the Incandescent bulbs and their sockets.
You should end up with something like this
Take your plastic pipe, cut to the length of the lens, and then cut out a section to fit into it.
Cut notches to fit as required
Take 1/4 graph paper, and using your spray adhesive, secure to your pipe on the outside of the curvature.
Drill lots of holes.
I spaced them every other square, the length of the housing from top, to the bottom of the rear reflector.
I also opted to drill 12 holes to make a reverse lamp
Note in the pictures that these LED's are secured with hot melt glue, I found that when this cluster was ran for more than a few minutes, the LED's actually generated enough heat to make the glue tacky. I strongly suggest using the spray glue to secure your LED's into the housing, as I did for the rest of the project.
I did however find that the hot melt was more than adequate for securing wires.
Insert and glue your LED's.... Lots... and lots... of LED's...
128 for this section on mine...
Kinda looks like a porcupine huh?
Other side
Start soldering your circuits.
I made six rows as marker, 10 as stop / turn.
I started at the top with mark, then next two S/T, Mark, and repeated until the last row at the bottom was mark.
Even the woman got involved in this one
Everything lit, checking for any failures
With no failures, coat the exposed wires with liquid electrical tape, preferably a couple coats for good measure.
Wire up your pigtail for your disconnect (this is where that 4 prong trailer connector comes in, allowing you to take the lamp off if required)
Heat shrink these connections
Clean up your wires, and glue them down
Glue the ABS / PVC pipe into the lens, and allow to cure.
Now your ready to wire the other end of that trailer connector into the truck side of the lighting harness, and install your lamp.
Make sure to fold down the LED's near the edges of the housing (near the mount screw holes) as they might make contact with the truck when installed and cause you headaches....
Reverse
Marker
Stop / Turn
All
Video of light in action
Last edited by a moderator: