How To Tint Tail Lights
 

what is the easiest and most effective way to tint/smoke your tail lights?

VHT nightshades. wetsand tails with 1k grit, spray a thin layer, let dry, spray again, repeat until you are happy with the darkness, clearcoat if you want it glossy, wax and done

Easy. Just go get some VHT nightshades from an autostore (Oriley ).
Remove the tail lights and shake the can well.

Put 3 or less coats on the lights any more then that depending on how thick or light you do the coats will be too dark and you won't be able to see the light.

Do it outside or somewhere where no dust or anything will get on it.

Then what i did was I turned my oven on too 100 degrees and I painted 1 light. Then stuck it in the oven for 20 mins and turned the oven off. Doing this helps the stuff settle and gives it a nice smooth finish.

Once 20 min has gone by take out the light turn oven back on at 100 and go paint another one. Then put the next one in and turn it back off... so on and so forth..

I cooked mine 1 at a time. And painted 1 at a time. Dont paint them all at once and then cook 1 at a time others might turn out not as good looking. Paint 1 and cook. Paint 2nd cook..

Once you have completed all that you git tinted tail lights! :) best of luck hope this helped!

Edit. Posted twice

^ nice double post lol, and idk about that oven trick, could cause bubbling

Nah its fine I did it to mine. Its just like they are on the car on a hot summer day. And I didn't have to wet sand mine they turned out pretty nice.

wet sanding will form a better bond and help with longevity

I agree

you can go to your local body shop and ask them to spray your tails with a black/clearcoat mix, this is permanent, but also comes out looking the best, plus you have a professional spray them. most body shops will charge around $50 if they do it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OSKA0ElKg1Q

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-8-hZP6-ZY8

Vids I followed.

thanks for all the opinions

Any time! :)

YES.

Nightshade is CRAP. Don't use that shit, never ever never...

Sand with 400 grit or so, then *Clearcoat*.. with a few spoonfuls of black until it sprays them dark enough in about 3 coats.

100x shinier and better looking that nightshade. Don't cheap out.. clearcoat is very cheap at napa, and so is black paint.. a pint of each is enough for a couple sets of tails. Even a $20 paint gun from harbor freight will spray it decently (better than rattle can) if you have a little painting experience.

Otherwise a bodyshop or a friend who shoots paints sometimes can shoot them real good like.

this is the only decent pic i have of mine, done the way i described.

Looks like poop....:ninja:
































:p Damage?

Mine don't look bad at all

I did mine with vht they don't look like junk.

I did mine with VHT too...

IMO 400 is too coarse. I wet-sanded the VHT with 600, and the clear-coat with 800

I wet sanded with 200 grit what on earth are you guys talking about its too coarse lol. I found it wasn't coarse enough and needed to go at it quite a bit to get some of the scratches out

200 grit is really coarse...

Compare the VHT side by side with a black/clearcoat mix and you'll see the difference.

Black/clearcoat obviously looks better.

For the price paid, if done right vht does pretty good.

You can't really compare a $100.00 booth job to a $12.00 rattle can. lol

when you wet sand it it nots not so bad its almost like paper

not doubting you at all. just some people's budgets are different, so if you're gonna do it the cheap way, you might wanna do it right so it doesn't look cheap. ;)

You were probably using 2000 grit

nooo was deff not 2000 lol, I doubled checked and it was 400 I don't know where I got 200 but it was 400

i used a urethane clear on mine after using vht nightshades then wet sanded with 2k grit then put some lens compound on it and buffed them now they look good i think

Are the tinted lights illegal? or just frownd upon?

their illegal for the most part, and some places do not pass inspection with them tinted. most cops will not bother you however

Illegal.

And wtf are you doing with 400 grit? lol

Illegal unless you have significant amt. of light IE. led conversion

400 grit worked fine for me, see how they turned out? lol I didn't sand afterwards however just before tinting