'65 Safari Taillight Replacement Help

[rburditt]

hi,
i have cracks in the plastic housing for my tail light. it is behind some rivets and i wondered how difficult this is to remove and if i could make matters worse by removing rivets and loosening the skin? i'm EXTREMELY nervous to remove exterior rivets. i'm afraid that i wont get things put back just right? maybe i'm being overly paranoid???? thanks for any help/advice?

here is a pic of it.

[69AmbassFl]

I would contact Andy at Inland Rv. To me the set up in your pic doesn't look factory. My 69 has aluminum tail light housings. Most AS i've seen in the early years have tail light housings riveted from the inside to the skin, have to remove interior panels to remove. Inland is located in California, open 7 to 4 pm pst. Inlandrv@aol.com, Phone ! 800 877-7311, fax 1 951 734-8132.

[goransons]

I agree, those are different from ours too, our 69 are cast aluminum, as are our 66.

[blacksheep]

Those appear to be the correct 1965 tail light housings as I have the same on my '65 Overlander. Unfortunately both of mine have large pieces broken out of the top flat part. My thought is to remove the lens and light assembly from the plastic housing and make repairs somehow (fiberglass? epoxy? abs repair stuff?) and then reinsert the assembly and lens. I am praying this will work because I don't want to remove rivets either and it appears a great many would have to be removed in order to extract the tail light housing.


Godspeed,
Trent

[1956Safari]

Does anyone have a source for 50's era LED Brake Lights? There are plenty of marker lights that seem to work well but I've yet to see rear lights that match.

[blacksheep]

I have wondered if these are available as reproductions, not that I would still want to remove rivets, but at least there would be an option. My guess is the factory had several complaints about these housings getting cracked or broken easily after they came into production and the housing was made to be the cast (?) housing on the '67 (?) and later models.


Godspeed,
Trent

[purman]

Vintage Trailer do some lights. I don't think they do led though....

http://www.vintagetrailersupply.com/...Lights_s/8.htm

[Inland RV Center, In]

Originally Posted by rburditt

hi,
i have cracks in the plastic housing for my tail light. it is behind some rivets and i wondered how difficult this is to remove and if i could make matters worse by removing rivets and loosening the skin? i'm EXTREMELY nervous to remove exterior rivets. i'm afraid that i wont get things put back just right? maybe i'm being overly paranoid???? thanks for any help/advice?

here is a pic of it.

The plastic housings are easily fixed with fiberglass, then painted.

We have that tail light with the original bulb as well as with LED.

Andy

[rburditt]

First off, thanks so much for the advice, etc. I thought i would share my finished product as well as before pics. i've uploaded a handful of pictures to this link.

Picasa Web Albums - bob - 65 Safari Tai...

the fiberglass repair wasn't as difficult as i anticipated and the repaired lights are so much more rugged than the flimsy originals. hope this helps some of you w/ the same problem.

thx,
bob

[purman]

HEY, those look great!!!!! good job...

[Airstream 65]

Great job, and thanks for the pictures! I have been wondering how I was going to go about fixing these on my 1965 Overlander. 2 Questions: 1. Did you have to remove any of the skin panels to get the housing out, or did it just slide out when you drilled out the rivets? And 2, are you going to change the tail light to LED, or stick with the original? Thanks.

[rburditt]

i did have to have the interior skins off in order to remove the lights. i don't think you can slide them out...they are installed from the inside and have a rectangular piece of aluminum behind them so that the rivet goes thru the exterior skin, through the housing, then thru the aluminum backing.

I did order a set of LED lights for it. i was really torn on this item. initially i just decided to clean them up, but then realized that the gasket under the lens is worn out w/ missing pieces...and i think the new ones will look better.

[modarch]

Those look good Bob!

[blacksheep]

Bob,

Wow! Kudos to you for sharing the fix with us. Now, to get myself inspired...

Godspeed,
Trent

[briheath]

Thank you for the pictures. I was thinking about having a local metal shop make some replica's out of aluminum. But I'm sure this would cost me a fortune. Your information will help. Thanks again.

[kennyp315]

I had the same problem with my '65 Globetrotter with the cracked tail light housing. I unfortunately have finished the inside of my trailer and can't take the inside skins off again. A surfboard shaper is molding me covers that will fit over the housing and help close the sloppy gap between housing and rivets. I wish that I had done it right the first time. Also I did replace my stock tail lights with great looking LED's. I had a old aircraft machinist turn some aluminum doughnuts/brackets which came out nice. They are posted on Kip' '71 Globetrotter Full Monty Kenny

[kennyp315]

Here is an my mold for '65 tail light housing repair. We made a reverse mold while on trailer. It would have been much easier to have done this while I had a bathroom skins out. I'm doing some remodeling on my trailer and thought that it was time to finish everything.

[tkasten]

kennyp315 - Nice work!

[kennyp315]

Thank you. The mold came out very nice. This is only the beginning, as we have to lay in the fiberglass very carefully to turn out each piece. It will take some work as even though each side is very close, they are slightly different. The good thing is that they will no longer leak, crack and be a mess. Also the 16th of an inch gap will be gone around the edge. It will look much better. I will post finished photo's soon.

[REDSLED88]

I have my interior out, so I think I'm going to try and remove the thick black layer of adhesive on the inside, remove the rivets and get the housing out.
I'm thinking of maybe dipping them in something to strengthen them.
Mine are not dented, just have cracks which leak.

Any ideas on what I would dip them in?

I was thinking fiberglass would be great for repair, but then I'll just have to repair again as the fiberglass cracks. Plus the fiberglass will create a larger housing all around.

Since they are plastic, maybe some bondo to repair cracks, and then dip then.

But in what?
Anyone used Plasti Dip? http://www.plastidip.net.au/plasti-dip

TIMK