richbk Posted February 4, 2006 Posted February 4, 2006 hi guys/gals has anyone adapted their rear lights to use the "spare" inner light mounting to add additional rear lights? read about it on an elise site,(sorry dont know how to do link thingies) and think it would be ideal for me, as i spend reasonable time on motorway, major routes and anything that highlights the car more to lorries etc. has got to be a good thing. it suggests wiring to continue "ring" to the spare bulb mounting in inside of fog light/reverse light cluster. also mentioned that this may be illigal, cant see how?? any thoughts cheers rich bk
Jonathan E Posted February 4, 2006 Posted February 4, 2006 Rich, The S2 elise was meant to have all the rear light clusters lit up, but some crappy EU law forced Lotus to disable the inner clusters. I think I understand what your wanting to do,in so much as you want all four rear reds to be lit?? if this is the case it can be done. First off, you need to look at the rear lights from inside the boot,the spare bulb mounting you refer to is probably blanked off,if so it is a real pita to do and in my opininon not worth the trouble. However very early S2's weren't blanked off as Lotus had a few light clusters made as they originally intended and they just removed the bulbs.If your car is the earlier type then you can purchase the bulbs and holders and just plug them into the loom for connection purposes. If its a later S2, first you will have to source the bulb holders and bulbs(not easy),then you'll have to splice into the loom for a feed and then you will have to carefully grind out the blanks in the light cluster to take the holders.... Hopefully I've followed your thread correctly if not I apologise. Just type out the site you found the info on,It will give me more idea of what you want to do. hth Regards Jon
richbk Posted February 5, 2006 Author Posted February 5, 2006 hi jon yes that is exactly what i want to do if its easy enough, i will have a look this evening and let you know if i'm going to attempt it many thanks rich bk
Jonathan E Posted February 6, 2006 Posted February 6, 2006 Rich My first S2 had the original units and I found that Nissan Almera bulb holders fitted perfectly although I had to make a few mods to the wiring,I left them on when I sold it only to find that my 111s had the units that were blanked off Doh!. It was a right pita to grind out the blanks and get them to fit. Looks a whole lot better though with all the lights working. I might have a go with this one when the weather is a bit more suitable. Regards Jon
lotus Posted February 7, 2006 Posted February 7, 2006 hi i have mine lit on my esprit, i didnt even realise only half should be working till this post,,,,cant be illegal as thay are red and all other supercars with round lights are totally lit up
Jonathan E Posted February 7, 2006 Posted February 7, 2006 lotus, They had to do away with the inner set of red lights because of an EC law thingy that means the two sets have to fit inside a square of a certain size and the S2 Elise lights didn't quite fit. Your Esprit will have either different distance between the two sets or the EC law, crappy silly thing, wasn't about when your Esprit was made. As far as legal issues are concerned I wouldn't think for a moment that any copper would be aware of it,so making all four work is an after market option,but Lotus couldn't get away with it. hth Regards Jon
lotus Posted February 7, 2006 Posted February 7, 2006 oh i got ya, it is a stupid law really, its like saying, oh lets make this low hard to see car even harder to see shall we. well my esprit has been modded to have the lights fitted so the bodyshop decided to right there own law i think ha ha ha ha does look nice though with 4 complete rings, looks like you mean buisness lol
richbk Posted February 9, 2006 Author Posted February 9, 2006 hi jon the bulb socket is not blanked off so should be able to mod quiet easily however only half the ring is light by this one spare socket, how do you get the other to light up? isn't that one the fog light, which i guess is brighter or as usual am i being dense on electrical matters rich bk
Jonathan E Posted February 9, 2006 Posted February 9, 2006 Rich, Hopefully this is what your looking to do,apologies for the late reply but I've been away for a few days,I've not really got time this evening but I'll post up in the morning as much info as I can. hth Regards Jon ps, I nicked this pic sometime ago can't remember where but thanks to whoever. pps,prepare yourself for a loooonnnngggg post
Jonathan E Posted February 10, 2006 Posted February 10, 2006 Rich, The inner units hold the fog lights as you say but Lotus use a dual filament bulb in there so you need to get a feed to the other filament, which you can take from the outer units, On most S2's when the lights are on it would look like this: ( ) ) ( ( ) Hope thats understandale, The other half of the inner units are the biggest problem as they are normally blanked off and they need carefully drilling out to accept a suitable bulb holder, if yours aren't blanked off then you just need a bulb holder and again need to get a feed to it, this can be taken from the loom that supplies the outer units. The bulb holders are notoriously difficult to get hold of, but Nissan and Merc have used them in the past so maybe a trip to thier parts dept armed with one of the Lotus ones as a match might do the trick(Lotus only supply them with the light units and they are £££). Nick Adams the Lotus tecchy guru said that running all the rears from the same loom won't cause any problems as the car was made to run like this from day one. So doing all the above won't overload any wiring/ fuses etc and you should end up with rear lights as in the pic above. Hope this is easy enough to follow. Regards Jon
richbk Posted February 10, 2006 Author Posted February 10, 2006 cheers jon thanks very much for taking the time to reply so comprehensively. i have printed off and am passing on to my mechanic pal to do whilst fitting quickshifter,bushes a repairng damage to front clam caused by reversing idiot, all for under 300 quid i hope thanks rich bk
Jonathan E Posted February 10, 2006 Posted February 10, 2006 rich, just do me a favour, if you find the right bulb holders let me know. Regards Jon
Jonathan E Posted February 22, 2006 Posted February 22, 2006 Hi Rich, I did mine this afternoon about a 2 hour job,but and its a big but I managed to "liberate" a couple of outer light units which came with the wiring pigtails. This made the job very simple in so much as all I had to do was drill out the blank on the inner unit,funnily enough if your careful the metal moulding has the exact shape for the bulb holders already cast behind the blank and so this makes it easy to fit the bulb holders.All that was left to do was to plug the pigtail into the loom and hey presto four working rears. Looks good and was much easier than I remember from doing my first S2. Only down side is that outer light clusters from a Lotus dealer are £80 plus vat.As I said mine were "liberated" not nicked and didn't cost very much at all. Shhhh, you aint seen me right!! hth Regards Jon
Jonathan E Posted February 22, 2006 Posted February 22, 2006 Steve, I don't own a digi camera, but the pic in post number 9 above is how it looks now. I'll get some pics up when I've borrowed a camera. Regards Jon Ps, if anybody needs a replacement outer rear light unit I've got two going pretty cheap,they don't have the wiring pigtails obviously.
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