Never cared for the taillights on my 2000 xk8, jeweled lenses look better but still not stirring. I like the mina dual set but finding them is a pain and spending 1/8 the cars book on taillights just isn't that exciting. If they made it go faster maybe but even then.

I began wondering if I could pull off frenching a 3" taillight into the factory lenses. Then I began wandering around ebay and home depot to make it happen. Using a 3" hole saw bit, drill press, 3" ABS black drain pipe, 3" glow ring 2 way LED, 4 way to 2 way trailer wiring adapter, and some ebay 1999 tails I got for $80, I'm about half way done. More specifically I have just put what I hope to be last coat of primer on the first lens.


Underneath the Masking tape is this light



I have some fender work for the body shop to take care thanks to the previous owner failings on pulling the fuel tank out of the trunk. I'll have these sprayed at the same time. I still have the originals to flop back should I want to return it to stock.

I was hoping to find a solution where reverse light were incorporated into the 3" fixture but I didn't have any luck. The center of the light is the brake and once the trailer converter is wired in it will also be the turn which is legal in the US... I think Europe still needs amber though... sorry.

I may go with a license plate style reverse light or just live without it. We'll see but I should be all in with paint for less than $200 USD and lose some of the soap bar rear end.

If there is interest I'll snap some pic as do the left one. Sorry for the upside down pics, Steve Jobs died too soon.

 

Interesting, looking forward to seeing the finished product.

 

These are actually 4". I bought yes ruff a year ago and just got back to working on it for some reason thought 3" and I can't edit the post from my phone.










Dremel out the interior














Epoxy tube and light into assy. Sand edges of tube flush with lens. Bondo imperfections, sand, bondo, sand, bondo more sand more prime sand prime sand until perfect.

 

Looks terrific. Great work, can't wait to see them on the car.

 

Nice, always a plus to see true mod's not just a bolt on!

 

Sneak peak. Definitely lets the rear hip come around a little more. Tvresque. Now just to make the mate.






There's the damage from ham fisting the gas tank.

 

Good work, while I understand your desire to make this a reversible mod, as long as the separation from the tail light and the body is appearent it still looks a little add on, molding in/ filling the tail light to the body would look a lot better. Just my 2 cents, regardless a great job and very nice looking.

 

I like it, really cool. I too love the look of the Mina's but haven't been able to bring myself to spend that much money on tailights, at least not yet

 

Yeah I'm on the fence the car only has 55k on it though, probably best to keep it reversible. The paint should draw the eye past the gaps a little better, plus the there's that odd seam between the bumper and the center of the tail anyway. Thanks for the encouragement.

 

Ok, that looks even better than I expected. I would be tempted to do three smaller circles, and then make the turn signals sequential, like the old T-Birds and Cougars (and modern mustangs) used to have.

I've determined, after the car is out of storage for spring, that this is the year I finally do this: http://www.jaguarforums.com/forum/xk...te-look-71233/

 

The guy from CT I bought a few things of off that was selling his XKR had some groovy taillights as well no?

 

I'm such a lame old stick in the mud...I think the originals are much more attractive, but that's not to take one tiny bit away from the really nice work on the mod to make it look like you want it to!

 

I see what you were going for, but I really think it needs a 4.5 inch round tail light for it to look right. To much empty space in that plastic..

It has the potential to look even better than the Arden ones, those always looks tacked on.

 

Ahh that's
what I was thinking..The Arden ones!

 

Believe me I'd love any of those options, alas 4" is what is readily available due to truck trailers and such. I still need to edit the post name, dunno why I remembered them as 3"