stuck in middle of taillight removal

[1998gstspyder]

okay guys so i removed my center tailight today follwoing this old thread http://www.dsmtuners.com/forums/showthread.php?t=27367&highlight=remove+center+taillight
once i removed it and took off the red eclipse part, i thought there would be a flat black area and i was going to leave it like that. but the center tailight part is not solid, it has a gap, heres a pic of what i mean... ive heard of painting it, but does that mean painting that red part? im pretty sure no one adds more plastic to it to make that part solid. ive even seens some cars that people put in their description, "not painted" and it was just a black solid portion..

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i want it to look like this
http://www.dsmtuners.com/gallery/showphoto.php?photo=43012&password=0&sort=2&cat=500&page=1

 

[dsmmyth]

okay guys so i removed my center tailight today follwoing this old thread http://www.dsmtuners.com/forums/showthread.php?t=27367&highlight=remove+center+taillight
once i removed it and took off the red eclipse part, i thought there would be a flat black area and i was going to leave it like that. but the center tailight part is not solid, it has a gap, heres a pic of what i mean... ive heard of painting it, but does that mean painting that red part? im pretty sure no one adds more plastic to it to make that part solid. ive even seens some cars that people put in their description, "not painted" and it was just a black solid portion..


i want it to look like this
http://www.dsmtuners.com/gallery/showphoto.php?photo=43012&password=0&sort=2&cat=500&page=1

Yes you paint over the red part. I've heard of people getting it to match their car with 99 cent rattlecan paint.

 

[1998gstspyder]

hey awesome thanks a lot, just painted it. my dad had an idea to put white out over the letterings, then paint it, then wash off the white out so i still keep the crome lettering over the black background....hope it works out fine. for now iits drying. ill post pics when im done

 

[DarkTalon2GNT]

hey awesome thanks a lot, just painted it. my dad had an idea to put white out over the letterings, then paint it, then wash off the white out so i still keep the crome lettering over the black background....hope it works out fine. for now iits drying. ill post pics when im done

To be safer with the painting and lettering thing..you know you can buy that ECLIPSE lettering from the factory(forgot how much), and you could remove it from that red section, they're like sticker type things.(This is case you didn't know of course)

 

[tylerk]

hey awesome thanks a lot, just painted it. my dad had an idea to put white out over the letterings, then paint it, then wash off the white out so i still keep the crome lettering over the black background....hope it works out fine. for now iits drying. ill post pics when im done

That's a good idea if it works. Waiting for pics...

 

[GOT 2RBO]

i had that center piece non-functional red lens dipped in CF. now it's a CF over-lay, instead of painting it. check my gallery

 

[1998gstspyder]

well the white out idea worked fine until when i was chipping off the white out, i noticed i was chippin off the crome as well, so I decided to paint the lettering red. Here are the results

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[turbo1307]

I think it looks good. Kinda dull, maybe its my monitor. I also think it would look good with all the badging removed. Here is a pic of my suggestion. Keep up the good work.

 

[Mike1992]

Looks good, but throw a couple coats of clear on it.

 

[1998gstspyder]

i put on high gloss coat afterwards?? did something go wrong

 

[Mike1992]

i put on high gloss coat afterwards?? did something go wrong

How many coats of clear?

 

[1998gstspyder]

two

 

[99blueRS-T]

no, i dont think you did anything wrong, mybe that "dull" effect you see is beacause of the picture, because of reflections, its a different reflection on tailights to the reflections on the bumper, compare the taillight to the trunk lid, same reflection, looks good to me , maybe you could get some other pictures...

 

[1998gstspyder]

btw i also noticed this little part i didnt paint. did the rest of you guys paint this part too? because when i removed it, I noticed that they were actually brake lights and if i were to paint over it, it would look weird. Just want to know what you guys did. A. paint over them and leave them as so? B. Paint over them but disconnect the power to it. C. or Something else

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[Liquidus]

I say leave it there, it looks fine the way it is.

 

[PaleDSM]

No, you don't paint over your third brake light.

Your spyder has the brake light there but a normal eclipse has it in the rear window. That is why you probably never noticed it in pictures of other people's car.

 

[PaleDSM]

i had that center piece non-functional red lens dipped in CF. now it's a CF over-lay, instead of painting it. check my gallery

How do you dip something in carbon fiber?

 

[1998gstspyder]

thanks for pointing that out paledsm, i was thinking its only a spyder thing, i wonder if any spyder has painted that part as well.

 

[RedTurboEclipse]

it looks good on black.. ive seen this done before.. but didnt really look that good.. but on black.. it looks clean.. nice job

 

[PaleDSM]

thanks for pointing that out paledsm, i was thinking its only a spyder thing, i wonder if any spyder has painted that part as well.

Depending on your inspection regulations you may not want to paint over your third brake light.