Third Brake Light Delete

[Jbam9]

I’ve always wanted to do this and thought it would be good practice for when I mold the 1M rear fenders in. Basically I deleted the third brake light by welding in sheet metal. it’s still needs bondo and sanding, but i’m already happy with the result. I plan on relocating the third brake light to inside the car, at the back of the headliner. Just wanted to share my progress so far

[iminhell1]

Just tuck an led strip along the top of the window. It'd look Audi'ish. Should be easy enough to hide the very thin wiring. Might have to play with voltages or tint to get just the right luminance.

[Jbam9]

Originally Posted by iminhell1

Just tuck an led strip along the top of the window. It'd look Audi'ish. Should be easy enough to hide the very thin wiring. Might have to play with voltages or tint to get just the right luminance.

Man I was originally going to make a light that sits in the little plastic trim piece at the back of the headliner but this may be a better idea. Definitely will need to explore some options

[Jbam9]

Finished welding the full patch, plugged the emblem holes and ground everything flat. Got the first layer of bondoglass on. Next up is rough shaping with the DA and then bondo

[jdt10768]

I think Daniel Stern makes a 3rd brake light you can mount at top middle of rear window. Bright and visible. This is a lot of work to remove 3rd light from trunk lid, but good job with the mod. Looking fwd to seeing the finished product

[MParallel]

Ha, I always loved the light in the trunk vs inside parcel shelf, or high up top.

[Jbam9]

Got the patch fully sealed on the backside- used PPG epoxy primer, then 3M seam sealer. It's not pretty but it should be water/air tight


Also did a couple layers of filler. Still need to go back and block it to get it perfectly smooth but it's coming along quite nice.


Once the body work is all done, I'm doing a full color change to nardo gray since I have to paint half the car anyways

[Jbam9]

Bodywork and paint finished. I love how it came out- no brake light and emblem looks quite sleek imo. I also think the 1er is going to look sweet in full nardo gray. It's not a perfect job, but overall for my first bodywork job I'm very happy with how it turned out. I'll be sure to post more pics once I get it all mounted back up and aligned properly.

If anyone is curious, I used PPG Omni paints (MP170 epoxy primer + MBC base + MC161 clear) and HF spectrum HTE spray gun, and got a quite good finish in my garage. It was my first time using PPG paints and an HTE gun, so I'm quite happy with the end result.

[ShocknAwe]

Awesome. I'm probably going to do the same with my CF trunk eventually. Makes me wonder what would be required since I obviously can't weld CF. No more broken brake lights.

Curious what you did for humidity control since you're in Florida, we have similar climates.

How was it picking up welding? Been heavily considering learning it since what I generally need to do is just tack jobs.

[Jbam9]

Originally Posted by ShocknAwe

Awesome. I'm probably going to do the same with my CF trunk eventually. Makes me wonder what would be required since I obviously can't weld CF. No more broken brake lights.

Curious what you did for humidity control since you're in Florida, we have similar climates.

How was it picking up welding? Been heavily considering learning it since what I generally need to do is just tack jobs.

I wish they made the carbon trunks without the light cutout lol, I've only seen them like that in fiberglass. Maybe you could get the CF blockoff plate made at a place like SendCutSend and then panel bond it in?

As for humidity control- I pretty much just prayed and got lucky It was 89 degrees with 80% humidity when I sprayed. I did wait until the evening and used slow hardeners to account for this, but I was still surprised it laid down so nicely given the environment. Maybe that's a testament to how good PPG paints are

Welding is actually not too bad. I did warp the sheet metal on the trunk a tiny bit because it's so thin and I didn't give it enough time to cool between stitches, but in general it's not too hard of a skill to pickup. Just get a cheap machine from HF and some scrap metal and start practicing. My only regret with learning welding was not learning it sooner. It's opened the door for custom bracketry, custom exhaust, block off plates, and much more

[tylerzgl]

Great post, was looking to do something similar to my e82 as I work on the 1m conversion this winter. Quick question for the sheet metal you used was it just aluminum and what gauge? Did you just trace the 3rd brake light over it and cut it to shape?