Resourceful Replacement for '70s Tail Light Cans

[Silverhobby]

When I upgraded the lights on my 1971 Caravel, I installed Gorilla sealed beam tail lights on it. No can was necessary since the lights are completely sealed. Check out
Maxxima LED Lighting and Accessories

[mello mike]

Originally Posted by funkill

If anyone is still out there ... are the round rear reflectors (in the lighting bar) pretty easy to replace? I did order those and figure that they are secured with an adhesive. Hope the old ones pop off easy. What should I use to reattach - I am a big consumer of liquid nail. But I know it isn't a fix all!
Laura

Laura,
The old ones pop out pretty easy. Even if they don't, you can break it to remove it. On one I had to use a flat bladed screwdriver to pry it out. It cracked, but who cares. I bought my reflectors from Oasis RV for like $1.50 a piece. They look great, as you can see from my earlier pic.

[StingrayL82]

Laura,

In order to save time, I just smashed the old Grotelite reflectors with the handle of a screwdriver. What I did was drill out the rivet, which holds the aluminum reflector housing...keep the housing and the aluminum washer, which you need to add to the rivet, to hold the reflector housing to the light fixture.

The new Grote number for the reflector is 40062. You can get it at your local NAPA, and price is around $3.00 per reflector.

Here is the result of a couple hours of cleaning replacing...I removed all of the lenses and sanded the face of the fixture, in order to get the rust stains from the old light buckets off.

[mello mike]

Looks great, StingrayL82!! Did you paint the stripes on your rubrails or is that a decal that you used?

[StingrayL82]

Mike,

All of the rails, which originally had tape, were repainted by South Jersey RV. They used Ford Blue. I'm not sure that the color matches what was originally there, but it looks okay.

[VintageRV]

Mello Mike is right that we are working on them. It has taken a little longer than we thought because we were hoping to come up with an "off the shelf" solution. One of the problems with all the truck cans available today is that they have an exterior flange for mounting. The cans used from 1969 to 1974 did not. They were simply screwed through their backs into the larger assembly. They do look very much like a tuna can except the interior mounting ring and the drip lip.

That mounting method is also why the depth of the can is very important. Working with one of our customers, we came up with an innovative way to create the cans again and should have something available by the end of September 2010.

Remember that on each side, one can is for an 1156 (single filament) and one is for an 1157 (two filament). Also, on the drivers side, one of the cans...I can't remember which one...has the fiber optics in it...a cool Airstream feature.

[Inland RV Center, In]

Both tail lights used the fiber optics.

LED tail lights and backup lights are available that replace the cans.

The cans, unfortunately, were suddenly removed from the market place, by the manufacturer, many years ago.

One of the tail light LED's that's available, can still be used with the fiber optic system.

Andy

[mello mike]

Originally Posted by VintageRV

Mello Mike is right that we are working on them. Working with one of our customers, we came up with an innovative way to create the cans again and should have something available by the end of September 2010.

Very cool, Steve. Will it be made of plastic or metal? This will be a nice, low cost alternative to the expensive LEDs.

Now, if you get the earlier Astradome (VTS-107) and the metal door latch for the late 50s/early 60s door-with-a-door (VTS-117), I would be really happy.

[VintageRV]

Who said it would be low cost, Wally?

Seriously though...

Wally, the cans will be milled from aircraft-grade aluminum and anodized.

And thanks Andy, for the correction on the fiber optics.

LEDs are very popular right now for a lot of applications in and outside of vintage trailers. For taillights, they do offer a slight safety improvement. My personal opinion is that LEDs on vintage trailers should be hidden behind original features at all times so that they do not distract from the vintage look.

[texasbound]

Originally Posted by mello mike

In order to save time I decided to just go ahead and purchase the ugly LED reverse lights for my Sovereign from Inland Andy. But I found an easy solution to dress up these ugly but very effective lights. See pic. I simply gorilla glued a brand new vintage style lens over the new LED. Looks vintage but is LED bright.

I was able to salvage the canisters for both tail lights and did this mainly to retain the Fiber Optic front view capability. I'm pretty happy with the way all the tail lights look and function.

Mike,

Thanks for the great posts on the LED conversion. I too got the inland RV LED taillights... Question about the three wires coming out of the bottom.... When I remove the old can will there be three wires there that I connect?

Thanks,
Leo

[Inland RV Center, In]

Originally Posted by texasbound

Mike,

Thanks for the great posts on the LED conversion. I too got the inland RV LED taillights... Question about the three wires coming out of the bottom.... When I remove the old can will there be three wires there that I connect?

Thanks,
Leo

Leo.

No to the 3 wires, since the can is grounded.

By the way, you can easily adapt those round tail lights to accept the tail light monitor cable.

Very carefully, in the dead center on the back side of the tail light, drill a # 30 hole about 3/8 deep.

Then insert the monitor cable and secure it in place with a little silicone sealer, on the outside only.

The monitor then works as good as it did with the original tail lights.

I discoverd this a few months ago, and the above should apply to the round LED tail lights that we sold even years ago.

Andy

[texasbound]

Thanks Andy! I'm excited to hook these up and see how they look.

Just to clarify, with the lights I got from you, the 66000, I remove the old can, and wire the "brake" and "blinker" wires?

Thanks,
Leo

[Inland RV Center, In]

Originally Posted by texasbound

Thanks Andy! I'm excited to hook these up and see how they look.

Just to clarify, with the lights I got from you, the 66000, I remove the old can, and wire the "brake" and "blinker" wires?

Thanks,
Leo

Leo.

Correct.

Well sort of.

The brake and blinker light wire is one and the same, which is the brightest.

The other wire is simply for the tail light, which is dimmer.

If you have the tail light monitor, you can easily modify the tail light, as outlined above.

Andy