What Tail lights Would Work on a 240Z ?

[Sleek Z]

 

Dan Juday and I have been asking ourselves about what tail lights from other makes & models of cars might make sense to swap into a custom tail light mod on a 240Z (260 & 280Z as well)? Pictured above is sample of a popular tail light kit sold commercially back in the '70's, one of several examples I have on display at

 

http://www.zparts.com/showcase/wczn20/index.htm

 

http://www.zparts.com/events/wcn2002/promo/index.html

 

I thought it might be interesting to put the question to the Paint & Body forum. Would anyone care to make suggestions? Be sure to mention the year & model of any you suggest.

 

For myself, I still feel that a custom tail light mod on a Z should be mostly designed and constructed from scratch in order to achieve an integrated and balanced aesthetic, but time, money and skill levels being what they are for many of us I suppose my approach may not be all that practical for some. Nevertheless, if any of you have original design ideas or illustrations or have mulled over the implications of shape and proportions of customized tail lights for an S30 body, I would like to see them. If enough designs come forth, perhaps I could publish them as a "tail light photo gallery" at ZPARTS.COM.

 

Returning to my original question, I've also been toying with seeking out year and models suggested as sources for tail light swaps and photographing them up close for purposes of creating a "swap tail light photo gallery for others to use as a project resource. If you guys make many suggestions, I'll try to round up photo samples of same.

 

OK, ball's in someone else's court. Hope one or more of you speak up.

 

Sleek Z

 

eric@zparts.com

[Boobala]

I think these might incorporate into the Z rear shape.

 

 

You would have to bury them a bit into a modified Z "tail-light surround" unless

can you figure out to make the wrap-around part work.

 

And if that don't work I think this is the way to go.

 

[Guest Frank280z]

I always wanted to put acura legend coupe lights in my z. But never followed up on the idea. This is a shot of a 94 coupe.

 

Frank

[Sleek Z]

Interesting start to the discussion. Dan called me today to point to the Acura Legend tail lights that somewhat interests him.

 

The ProCar lights, although very trendy at the moment, strike me as a look hard to adapt to both the car's scale, shape and classic sports car stature, but guided by the right instincts and matched with the right paint job (dark colors or black would be my suggestion) I could see someone successfully pulling it off.

 

I also have been looking carefully at the new plastic reflector designs being used on the internal red and amber sections of these trendy looking lights wondering whether these internal sub-components could be cut out or sectioned in some way for adaptation to the Z?

 

The biggest draw back I see to both the Legend and ProCar look is that the lights are either too large for my taste or seem to be totally out of scale and visual balance with the stock Z tail light inset panel area or the rear dimensions of the S30 body.

 

The other day one of those Pontiac sport vans of the early to mid '90's with the tall, skinny, slightly arched, vertical tail lights mounted from mid height to roof line on each far corner of the van's sides, went by me and I found myself trying to envision these lights (made up of 4 red sub sections) arrange horizontally in the upper arch of an S30 rear section just below the hatch lip arch line. Not quite right I suspect, but close to one design consderation I think critical to a S30 custom, that of strengthing the low, wide stance of a flared Z by using wide, thin horizontal design themes integrated into the tail light panel area and below the bumper. Sorta Ferrari Testa Rosa or Lambo look of many Italian exotics of the past 10 years.

 

OK, that my thoughts for now.

 

btw, if many of you are going to post tail light photos in this thread plus all your graphic sigs & humorous pics, please keep in mind that if they are too large or too many, that modem users may not be able to load and view this thread without long download times. Please try to economize for their sake or just drop in the URL to the image for them to check out at their convenience.

 

Sleek Z

[Wagz]

I've always thought the '93+ Celica Supra lights would be an interesting swap. The slight curve to the lens present a bit of a challenge.

 

[Guest KraZ4spd]

I like all of your sugestions.

 

How about something like this

 

[Guest gprix1]

I'm thinking with Dan's fender flares and classic style flip-up gas cap, something like this would look cool.

 

[Sleek Z]

INTERESTING1

 

Yes, now your talk'in my design "sensibilities" a bit more! Overall, I like the idea of this one because this shows how a home customizer could start creating similar designs and constructing them in a home work shop while slightly altering and scaling different pieces to develop a visual rhythm that properly expresses his project look while nicely integrating into any color paint job he decides on.

 

Two other strong points of this design/construction approach that I see is that each light transmitting section can be made up from bits and pieces of off the shelf or junk yard salvaged lens or even hobby store craft making products and the matched (or not) body color look allows a fairly modern reinterpretation of Nissan's 30 year old S30 rear area look.

 

btw, what car brand/model is that tail light on and is the bottom one a real photo of the light lit up or has the effect been Photoshop'd into it?

 

Thanks for posting that one.

 

Sleek Z

[Sleek Z]

Oops!,

 

While I was writing my last response someone else post ahead of me with a photo I was not comment on (although interesting in it's own right). Just to be clear, my last comments refer to the photos that Nemeziz posted above.

 

--Sleek Z

[Sleek Z]

Dan,

 

It is not the literal re-use or copy of the light design Nemeziz showed so much as the customizing potential of those lights done in circular, rounded and non-round designs broken into seperate light modules, that most interests me. All kinds of arrangements of multi shaped back side refractor surfaces (concentric rings, radiating lines and even mondarian'ish overlapping rectangles) and faceted colored glass interts and mix and match of red, amber, clear, white and even "blue dot" components could be arranged into designs that could possibly be dot legal (red and amber colors must be of correct hue, saturation, refraction and brightness to be legal on the street) and perfectly balanced to the original recessed tail light panel above the rear bumper area.

 

However, I could see how even a straight copy of Nemeziz 's design could look more integrated and 'correct' on a Hybrid Z concept design than you may be giving credit to at this point.

 

Limitless possibilities if one does not get too carried away in filling up the panel's "empty" design space originally intended to define the Nissan Z car look of that day.

 

Now, once a customizer adds flares as large as yours, I think the potential to take the rear lighting design beyond the confines of the Nissan panel increases decidely.

 

Once you have altered the shape of the orignal car dramatically, I think any customizer could explore the entire back area below the bumper and out into the large rear flares as potential tail light mounting areas using many shapes not appropriate within the original S30 panel area.

 

For instance, just draw in the basic outlines of the rear of your flared car including the flare bulges, rear panel recess and bumper dividing line area in photoshop or with a clear overlay on top of the photo and color in between in black or dark gray and then draw freehand tail light out lines or designs across any area that interests you and fill them with red and amber tail light detail photos as aproximated effect patterns to see what the potential each may have. Next copy that layer to one above it and use the levels and hue/saturation adjusters to create a "lights on" effect and then run it through an animated gif program or Flash movie setup and wah lah, instant on & off test of your taill light design!

 

Do a selection of area outside the car, darken and/or desaturate the surrounding area and you can aproxiamate the car seen at differnet hours of the day and early evening. See the possibilities in this kind of a exploration?

 

Ball's now in someone else's court,

 

--Sleek Z

 

However, I could see how even a straight copy of Nemeziz 's design could look more integrated and 'correct' on a Hybrid Z concept design than you may suspect.at this point.

[ZROSSA]

Nissian made a very ugly little van called a s-cargo a few years ago. It has flat D shaped taillights that would be easy to do. I will give some of these a go when the body work starts. I will try to sink them into the panel a little as well. I really liked the look of the new gt40 show cars rear lights as well. They would look great on a z. They had me looking for large round tailights for a while. I was thinking you could modify early falcon or cortina lights. Take of the crome and give them a tidy up. Could work. Sorry I dont have any photos of the s-cargo lights. I have looked but can only find side or front shots. I might see if I can pick some up in a couple of weeks when i am in Auckland, So will get photos then.

 

Cheers

 

Douglas

[Boobala]

S-Cargo:

 

[Guest Anonymous]

Common Dan, Dare to be different:

 

 

1961 Continental... Your lucky I didn't find the 59 cad ones I was looking for.

 

Seriously though, the 67 GTO looks pretty good, as does the 68 firebird (that was my suggestion since you were looking for pontiac to match the motor/trans... ) Good luck in your hunt, if I run across any Hupmobile lenses or anything down there like that, I'll send them on.

 

Regards,

 

Lone Soon to be In Az For Good... ( )

[Guest KraZ4spd]

I don't know where those lights came from. I just did a search and they came up.

 

Sleek Z, I'm with you. I posted those with the thought of the unlimited potential of customization. It gives me more of a picture of what could happen if you sectioned out one of the procar lights.

[Dan Juday]

What about 300ZX lights turned upside down?

 

[pparaska]

Somebody here (my memory is going) put Z31 (I think) tail lights into the back of their Z and it looked great to me. Someone else did 68 Firebird-esque custom lights and I loved that too!

 

Many years ago I became entranced with the tail lights on my buddies' 68 GT500 Shelby's. Rectangular, with 3 squares next to each other, and they came on sequentially from the center area of the car to the outside when the turn signals were activated. These are the same or very close to the 60's Cougar tail lights. The chrome surround would not look right, but that kind of design, or at least a sequential setup appeals to me.

 

I'd rather not see Dan go with those clear light housings with circular lenses inside or red, yellow, etc. Too trendy for that car. That car needs something unique, but timeless.

 

I also think the GTO250 taillights shown are way too small to be practical. Make the lights get the attention of the drivers behind you so they don't rear end you. I've seen way too many Z's rear ended, and some of the owners told me that they thought it was partly the fault of dim Z tail lights.

[Wagz]

Dan -

 

Actually, after I saw Eric's post I went and searched for Supra sites. So, no, I didn't actually photograph those myself. But, were on the same wavelength. I'm hoping to take the photos I've found and super-impose them on pics of my (or other's) Z to come up with an idea of how they would look. I need to get actual measurements from the Supra lights. I'll post when I come up with something.

[Dave]

1967 GTO

 

[Dan Juday]

Well, since my name has been mentioned here more than once it must be time for me to chime in.

 

Sorry Eric, I can't agree with you about those taillights Nemeziz put up. Nothing personal, they just make me

 

I also had the idea about the Legend lights. The size and shape is about right. And they are relatively flat unlike 99% of modern cars. Has anyone else noticed that almost all the latest cars have rap-around taillights? The week spot on the Legend lights is that they are just not that inspiring.

 

Now those Supra lights, they have some potential. Wagz, it looks like you may have photographed those yourself. If you own a pair how about somehow attaching them (with tape or something) to the back of your Z and taking another shot for us to ponder?

[Guest Anonymous]

The shelby gt lites like Pete mentioned are pretty cool. One word of caution on old Ford sequential turn signals. They suck as delived stock. The have believe it or not a small motor driven set of cams with a microswitch that triggers each light!

Replacement of the unit with a simple electric black box replaces all of it and it works great, I had it in my 67 Tbird. I was gobsmacked to see a mechanical/electrical based sequential turnsignal the first time I saw it and said WTF is this?

 

Regards,

 

Lone

 

Ps: Pete I remember the Z31 light setup too, it looked good.