does anyone know how to smoke your taillights. the cheap overlays just arent suffice. they look cheap and probably dont last. got any suggestions? thanks

 

the overlays are the best way....they wont go anywhere and last as long as you want them too and if you get ticketed for them you can pull them off on the spot. just my
$.02. good luck

 

yeah. where did you get your information? the overlays on ebay are nice quality despite them being "cheap". my buddy has a set and they look good, plus have been on for a good minute now.

 

I install ebay pre cut tint kits for taillights all the time. I own a tint shop and I personally do a few a month. They are not the easiest things to work with. If you know someone that has done them before, take it to them. It wont look good if you try it yourself. With some exceptions..old civic hatches, integras, and a couple other models have flat ish taillights so its a lil easier. I agree tho if you get pulled over you can just rip it off, as compared to the real way to do it. If you want it to look perfect and maybe if you have an extra set of stock lights, here's what you do. Take some black paint and mix in about 2 or 3 times as much basemaker as it says to. spray it on something and add more paint if you want it darker or more basemaker if you want it lighter. Take your lights out and spray em like you would any other body part.

 

I got the material smoke and yellow... they are kind of hard to intall.. i have the smoke tint precut to cover the reverse light of the Si tail light. here is picture.

with the same material could tint the whole tail light but is kind of hard.

pm me if interesting stickerguynyc@yahoo.com

 

Yeah overlays FTW.

The Spray-on tint is very difficult to make look good, and if you ever go to sell the car you will most likely have to buy new taillights.

 

I agree that the film will yeild the most consistant results but I used VHT niteshades with great success finished off with a can of clear coat, it turned out just like I wanted.

 

This is an example of why people make fun of civics.

 

I hope you, your car or both are tastefully modded with a useless post like that.

 

OH and people make fun of civics cuz their civics, not cuz they smoke out their taillights to much.

 

Why is that? I don't see anything wrong with that picture. It's just an individual preference in styling. There are tons of other non-Civic cars out there that have done the exact same thing to.

People don't make fun of all Civic owners.....just the ones that manage to strap some absurd barrage of graphics on it with decals of parts they don't even have and over-sized lip kits.

 

lamin-x is good stuff...

 

^
Yeah, definitely that...

 

Thats YOUR interpretation of why people make fun of Civics, hers is them having blacked out lenses.. its all a matter of opinion

 

She's not stating her own opinion...she's drawing a generalization that people make fun of Civics because of cosmetic mods like that...when that's not necessarily always the case. There are much bigger and far more logical reasons people draw the "ricer" impressions on some civic owners...and it has alot to do with other factors rather than a simple tinting addition that's done on all kinds of vehicle makes and models. But then again I guess I'm drawing my own generalization to....who doesn't? But in actuality I've never met a person that thought tinting the lights on a car was a "ricer" move. I've actually received compliments for doing the exact same thing to my car...and not just from the import crowd either.

I find it kind of amusing actually because in my town if it were a red SVT Cobra or a red vette with blacked out lenses then nobody would think twice about it....but as soon as the poor little red civic with the tinted lenses rolls in.....all of a sudden it's "just another "ricer" and an ugly POS. That's basically the kind of attitude I've come to see hanging out at some of the local meets. I park my car and just listen to what other people have to say....and some of it is pretty interesting....and sad at the same time.

And then again I guess THAT's just another opinion to....but I'm pretty confident alot of people would agree with me. At least anyone who has been around long enough to notice just how divided the import and domestic community really is.

 

thanks for the responses i will give the overlays a try cause they are not that expensive. the red civic looks really good with the vht niteshades. good work.

 

Smoked tailights on any car is not attractive if it is on an EVO or STI same thing, i'm just saying people underestimate civics because of these mods.

 

Opinion.

Opinion.

That makes no sense. People underestimate civics because they are so inexpensive. The same as how people overestimate BMWs and Mercedes, because they cost so much. However, rice is fundamentally detrimental to the tuner scene.

 

I could not have said it any better.

I'm usually not a fan of tinted tails, but to each their own. But Kid's car looked good because he had blacked out badges to compliment it.

 

regardless of how people may question the aesthetics of tinted tailights, you guys are forgetting one thing - SAFETY. which is what the DOT vehicle codes are for in the first place.

i cant stand tinted tail lenses because it greatly impairs the ability for the bulbs behind them to actually shine visible light. If I rear end your car, I'm blaming your tailights. You think automatically since I rear-ended you its my fault? Sorry pal, violations of DOT vehicle lighting codes can make it your fault. Am I being brash? sorry, look at my avatar location, I'm surrounded by people who think its cool to make their tailight lighting impossible to see.

Granted, like the NYC poster proved, there are tasteful tint overlays out there that still leave usable light.

However, the red civic has barely left any usable light to shine through.

you want to call me a hater, go ahead. just dont get mad when you get rear-ended and you get blamed for it.

to the original poster - if you want to smoke your tails, just make sure you leave usable light. Its do-able. Also, make sure what you do is reversible. You may or may not regret the decision to modify your taillights.

 

Allow me to apologize in advance....I hate to do this to you but,

(1) Saying that smoked taillights on any car is not attractive is just a matter of OPINION.....catch that? Here let me help you.....OPINION. There are LOTS of people that find it to be a subtle and good looking addition to a car. Since I've gotten my lights tinted 17 people (yes I kept count) have come up to me asking where I got the film done or how you do it. Most of them from school. 7 of them own some form of muscle car 3 mustangs, a few firebirds and a couple camaros. I even had a 50 year old man who just bought a Pontiac G8 ask me about it at a gas station. So apparently it's "attractive" to more than just us Civic owners.

(2)

Wrong. People underestimate Civics because they are considered to be an economy car. Not because someone decided to add some smoke to their lights. People underestimate the Si because the ignorant folks driving the pony mustangs with 2 more cylinders and twice the displacement never expect the tiny little Si motor to out-perform and out-accelerate their precious MUSTANG.....and in some cases even the older convertible version of the V8s as well. People underestimate Honda Civics because they fail to understand the meaning of power-to-weight ratio......and then they wonder why their Firebird just got ripped by a swapped hatch.

 

That would depend on the type of tint used to darken the lights. I'm not sure how dark Lamin-x is, but the particular brand of film I use allows a significant amount of light to still be transmitted through the film. I would say just estimating.....the output is reduced MAYBE 10%....which is not anywhere near enough to cause visibility problems with other drivers on the road. And on top of that I left the 3rd brake light (on the Si wing) un-tinted as well. If my light visibility was significantly reduced I would have been pulled over a long time ago....this tint has been on my car over a year now....and police have followed directly behind me and not done a thing. No citations, no warnings.

 

i guess since police have followed directly behind you and not a done a thing, with no citations and no warnings, its perfectly legal and perfectly within DOT regulations. just like when someone goes over the speed limit, if the cops arent pulling them over, it must be perfectly legal, right? in reality, the cops probably had better things to do than pull you over for just your tails, because if he did, you'd be on here posting "damn cop pulled me over for my taillights, he should have been catching terrorists and murderers instead" or something to that effect.

and even if you claim that it might be reducing output from the bulbs by only 10%, you're not putting into account that you're reducing the reflector matrices (like the ones on bicycles - the ones in your tailights and in your turn signals) by much more than 10%, and even more when the lights arent activated (when the car is parked).

in the end, its your car, and your taillights.

 

If you rearend someone, it is your fault, except for very rare circumstances. 99% of the time, if you rearend someone, you are following too closely, too quickly, or just not paying attention. If you have you headlights on at night, you can see a car in front of you, whether they have stadium lighting for taillights or are missing the rear portion of their car. I understand that dim lights is annoying but you should be able to notice a car slowing down quickly whether their brake lights are dim/broken or not. You wouldn't speed up and t-bone a car that's stuck in the middle of the road simply because they don't have a brake light on the side of their car.

All of this being said; I believe that before Kid's car burned to the ground (I think the tinted tails self combusted) he had posted a picture of his car with the tints and the lights on, and they were plenty bright. I know RICO has and his were also bright enough. I'm not a fan of head/taillight tints, but to each their own.

 

I would assume so. If they had better things to do they would be hauling *** past me, not chillin behind a honda civic. According to Texas law the taillamps must emit a light visible from 1000 ft. away...which mine are. No specification is made regarding tinting of them. Maybe that's why they don't do anything. Who knows.

If the police KNOW a vehicle is speeding and have clocked them with the gun or other device then it's their obligation to enforce the law and pull the vehicle over. If they do not....well then they are simply not doing their job or have a more urgent distress call to take care of that takes priority over a traffic misdemeanor.


No actually I wouldn't post it on here, but I appreciate the ridiculous assumption. I guess since you know everything about me you should tell me what I'm going to eat for dinner tonight.