XBSITE - The Definitive Source for the Scion xB

this is a great mod and is cheep and easy to do.

things you will need
a philips screw driver or a 10mm socket, sorry i don't remember witch but both and easy to come by and if you don't have at least thease 2 tools............ then ............ well............ im not so sure you should be thinking about doing a mod to your car.
a hot glue gun
a soldering iron
beer............ beer is always good to have when working on your car, it helps you stay calm and not rush threw things, and well if you f-up your car at least you will have a good buzz and not be that up set aboput it............. well the buzz is the importiant part. if you don't drink then invite a few friends over that do so they can enjoy the beer and watch you tear your car apart.
the beer is very importaint and is a step that must not be skipped.
i my self prefer Bud Light LIme or Corona

but any beer will do.



oh and you may want to have some sort of LEDs on hand, i used three 2.4" white flex strips from oznium


http://www.oznium.com/led-flex-strips

start by lifting your lift gate

YES SIR!
look at all that custom suade, BLING BLING
sorry i got a little too excited for a second

then remove the 3rd break light cover


next remove the 2 screws / bolts, sorry i don't remember what was there.
i took it apart some time ago and just neve put them back because there realy arn't needed to hold it in place.


now the housiong just pops off


on both sides you will notice a small tab, carfully lift and pull and the red lens will come off, be carfull because if you breake thease tabs you may have to use alot more hot glue to put it back together and that wouldn't look good.


remove the bulb by just pulling it out.


now you can do this several ways, i chose not to cut any factory wires. insterd i broke the bulb with a light tap from a hamer


and used a small needle nose pliers to chip the small piecses off


then i cut the filement tabs off and seperated them

this is going to be what you will solder your lights to so it will be plug and play

now is the time to chug one of those beers and plug in your soldering iron and the glue gun you will be needing them soon

get what ever LEDs you are going to be using and messure about 6"
well you could get alway with more like 4" but i went with 6" because i wanted to be sure i hade enough wire


do the same to all the lights


now strip them back about 1/2"


and twist them all together


ok its now time for you to see how good you are with that soldering iron......... me, im a pro.
make sure you put all the + wires together and all the - wire together, this is almost as importiant as the beer, speeking of withch, take another big bulp of that ice cold goodness.


next take your assembled LEDs and solder them the the leeds you made on the bulb, it doent mader what wire you put on what end.
LEDs will only work one way but you can just pull the bulb back out and turn it around if they don't work at first, anyway thats a later step


you can now unplug that soldering iron and pic up your hot glue gun.
i love hot glue, it can do 1000s of things duct tape just can't..... well IMO anything is better then duct tape



stupid 20 pic limit!
YO Dave, how am i going to do a good DIY with a 20 pic limit!



..

20 pic limit..........thats got to change!

ok ..... here is the rest of the DIY




ok now cover all of your soldering connections with hot glue, this will protect it from touching something elts and turning you car into a fire ball and protect the connections from moisture and corrotion.


the Oznium LEDs come with thease handy little 3M stips so you can use those to attach the lights to the inside of the housing.


you can do them how you want but this is how i did mine


stick the tail with the bulb base threw the hole like so


and connect it to the factory socket


now is the time to test the LEDs to make sure you have them hooked up right. tell one of your friends to go push the break peddle, hay ..... they have been drinking your beer and poking fun at your car and asking if this is going to make it faster so the least they could do is step on the peddle for you.
if the lights don't come on then pull the bulb out turn it 180 and plug it back in.
if only some of the light come on and some don't then well you may have had too much to drink and need to go back to the begining and start over.
hopfully eveything is working at this point.

use a little hot glue to hold back some of the extra wire


ok now its time to put that red lens back on and make sure those little clips i told you not to break are snaped into place


push the housing back on to the lift gate


you can put those screws / bolts back in if you want, ive found that its not needed, and you could be doing some weight reduction by leaving them out, always a bonus.


now put the cover back on


grab another one of those beers and enjoy because you are done


i wish i had gone with three or four of the 4.7" strips becasue this didn't turn out as bright as i would have liked it to.

nice nice nice...

I dig it

Nice idea

Very nice write up. I've never thought about using a bulb like you did. Very clever you are