Front Clearance Light Repair and Improvement (2 Viewers)

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Sep 27, 2008
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I noticed one of the front clearance lights was not working on my 60. The lens was OK, but the socket/gasket had fallen apart and was unusable.

The gasket/socket is no more from my understanding, what are the options...

I looked in my spares, and unfortunately, no front clearance gasket/sockets, but several amber lenses and many rear red clearance lights.

I started to look at the red rear lights, and found they are basically the same shape and size, but with a sealed socket and much better gasket. The wheels spun...

I decided to convert the rear red clearance lights to front amber's, and it was quite easy and work great. Here is how I did it.

1) I used a razor knife to separate the reds lens from the sealed plastic socket by making several passes along the joint until they started to come apart.

2) After separating the socket and red lens, I scraped the glue and any remaining lens off, and sanded nice and clean.

3) The amber lens has a boss molded around the screw holes used to locate the lens in the base. This is larger then the rears socket base. I used a Dremell with a small flat ended rotary file to do this.

4) Note - The sockets, lenses and body mounting holes are directional, so mark them how they will be installed

5) I used 5 minute epoxy to bond the amber lens to the rear socket. I did this in two steps -

A) I placed a dab of epoxy around the screw mounting boss, and ran a small bead around the perimeter of the socket. Then placed the lens on base and clamped it.

B) Next I ran a nice bead around the socket and lens joint. The epoxy is somewhat self leveling, so this was easy and came out nice and smooth. The are a couple of drain holes in the amber lens which are no longer needed as the new assembly is water tight. I sealed these with epoxy.

6) The plug ends of the front and rear clearance lights are different. Luckily I had extras of the rear clearance light pig tails with plug ends. These plugs come a part easily with a simple tool you can make or buy. You just have to depress a spring pin on the plug to allow the metal plug end to slip. The rear and front pins are the same.

7) Mount them up.

This took a total of 15 minutes to do both front clearance lights. I think the rear design is superior to the original front lights. The mounting hole spacing is exactly the same and they look good.

When you compare the front and rear lens and socket shapes, you will notice the front amber's taper a little on one end, When I filled the joint with epoxy this is covered and the rear rubber trim gasket covers this completely.

I think this was a good and easy fix.

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Here is the tool I used to swap the plug ends, the revised plug end, and the finished results

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Yeah, the front markers were an inferior design compared to the rears. Destined to disintegrate. Probably intentional.
 
Nice. Both my fronts need replacing....again. Thought my front bulbs were burnt out, no
they're just illuminating the deep innards of the quarter panels.

Are the rear assemblies still available?
 
Used is what I had and used. Check part out section and buy lamp, gasket and pig tail.
 
Nice job Doug!
There used to be an overseas OEM yellow front 24 volt marker available that a thick rubber gasket. It was just a matter of changing to a 12 volt bulb.
I grabbed some on Ebay some years back.
I haven't seen any available in recent years.
That would be a job for Onur. :hillbilly:

Not sure if the overseas part number was enshrined on garage door or not..

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The front gasket fails sooner than the rear because of the engine heat....or at least that's my theory

Both of my bulb holders just fell apart, so a.new complete unit made since

But good creative fix :)
 
Nice work there Doug.

The heavy duty 24V ones are NLA. Too bad because they are much more robust that the stock flavor.
 

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