i live in nova , the ones you showed in the OP are great, they come with instructions too, just have alot of patience and don't do it on a windy day like me (makes it 200 times harder)

 

sorry to get back to ya soo late, well, depending on the style of overlays you picked......meaning, Gtr's with reverse cut outs or others, i would say pick a spot, say...the reverse light section to line up and go from there. Just take your time with it. It will definitely involve some heating, stretching to conform the vinyl to the tail lights. Squeegee the areas that you're happy with and align properly, if you have to repull the vinyl up....make sure to apply some soapy water to that area. Kind of hard to give you a exact method to applying, i used to do window tinting in my younger yrs so, i kind of have a little advantage to someone that hasnt done this stuff before + i've been doing this for awhile now. Gl with the process.

 

definitely correct on that, you dont want dirt/sand/trash getting on the adhesive portion of the vinyl, if you do......you're pretty much screwed. Even though the tail lights are pretty flat, there are sections that arent and that is where it good to know how to get the vinyl over those curvy areas, how much to stretch and where to stretch the vinyl from.

 

Thanks for the advice... I've watched a few videos already, and I was familiar with the heat gun/ blow dryer idea as well as the soak in soapy water, be sure to remove all wax/residue from tail lights, etc etc.. I picked up some GTR overlays last November, so thats what I'll be using. I was more curious about how hard it is to get the vinyl to conform to the edges and such. I have the 03-05 tails, so I don't have to worry about to much on the face itself, however the sides are what have me most concerned. I suppose I'll ask around for pricing locally, but I may still give it a go myself.. Thanks again for the advice.

 

So It's update time...

Since today was such a beautiful day here, (low 70's) and I was feeling very motivated, I decided to give it a go, and try installing my overlays. After reading/watching pretty much every video/walkthrough i could find over the past week, I felt pretty confident going in. I have an '05 OB G and purchased Gloss black overlays.

Right off the bat the overlay came off good, went on nice, and I was feeling pretty good about myself. With some adjusting and lots of water I was getting the hang of things it seemed, and I progressed nicely through my first overlay. All in all I spent a good 30-40 minutes untill I felt I was ready for the Heat gun/hair dryer stage to finish up the overlay. I began using the dryer watching as the vinyl shrank and proceeded to smooth out the edges which was really all I had left at this point... and then it hit me....

I installed the left overlay on the right side...

I immediately removed the overlay and re-wetted the vinyl. After cleaning the left taillight I then attempted to install the overlay again, but the damage had been done.... Had I not used the hair dryer I would have been fine, but since I was about half way through the hair dryer stage before I caught it, I had already shrank/warped the overlay too much. After trying to get it to line up for about 15 minutes, I finally threw in the towell. So I'm out $30... and now have to re-order a new set.

My mistake came because I didn't pay attention to which overlay I was removing from the paper untill after I had removed it and submerged it in the bucket. A black overlay looks glossy on both sides when wet, and seeing as this was my first install it never even dawned on me that I was doing it wrong.

The whole experience wasn't a total loss though... I did learn quite a bit, and after essentially completing one, I can say that the process really isn't that difficult. I've never installed an overlay, or tint before, however the process is pretty straight forward. So for those looking into doing this themselves I offer this advice...

1) Start from the inside part of the taillight. (The part closest to Mt. Fuji).
2) Line up the clear reverse light first.
3) Line up the small brake lights next.
4) Line up the two large brake lights next.
5) USE LOTS OF WATER. For anyone that has ever worked with clay it's a very VERY similar process. the more water you use, the easier it is to work with.
6) Work in direct sunlight if possible (Assuming the temp is lower then 85). Working in direct light helped me stretch and mold the vinyl as I removed the pockets of water/air. The sunlight helps dry out the vinyl as well as keeping it a bit warmer and more pliable then it is on it's own.
7) BE PATIENT... every time I thought I ran into a problem with a bit of smoothing and some time it worked itself out.

and probably most important.. Make sure you install the correct overlay on the correct tail light.

 

^ how do you install the left overlay on the right taillight? did you not feel the slight sticky part of it on your fingers?

that's weird that you couldn't remove it and redo it.. the first time i did my overlays.. i removed it after like 45 minutes because i thought i could do a better job and it came off fine (and when i sprayed it with water.. it reinstalled just fine too) i even used a hair dryer.. surprised it messed up on you after only 15 minutes

also, make sure not to press hard when you're trying to get rid of the "wrinkles" around the curves.. you'll end up creasing the vinyl and be screwed forever.

at least you have 05 tails.. you don't have the damn dimples which make it 9999x harder to install lol.

 

Being it was my first time, I really didn't know what I was doing or what I should be feeling or looking for... I was just going by the overall look. In hindsight yeah it was really obvious that I had them on wrong, however the vinyl was still adhering to my car as it was drying out, and I just kept adding water so I didn't recognize the problem untill I was about done. The problem i ran into was that once I flipped the overlay over, it had already been somewhat formed to the other taillight, so I had parts that had been formed/stretched in some areas, and parts that had been shrunk down in others. I could easily a solid contact around the reverse light, but then the top right edge near the trunk had red taillight exposed. If I moved the vinyl to properly cover the edge, the reverse light was no longer centered and I had a sliver of red tail light exposed there. It wasn't a HUGE problem, but it was enough to justify me to scrap the project and start over. All I could hear in my head were the hundreds of forum members on here bitching about the red being exposed and how it didn't look right. $30 sucks, but it's not that bad. I'm sure I'll get it the next time around once I order more.. My custom LED side markers took 2 attempts as well, so this isn't the first time I've screwed up a project.

 

^ it's all good, at least you took something away from this mishap. i ebayed some GTR 6/10 overlays for like $3 (free shipping) which are worth $35.. that was pretty sweet

keep an eye out and you might get a really good deal. that way, you won't feel too bad about the $30 you dropped first time around

 

Good write-ups guys .

B@t

 

So I finally went ahead and did my overlays myself. Let me know what you guys think. This was my first time working with vinyl.

 

2 things...

1) did you order flat/matte black overlays? They don't look nearly as glossy as mine did/do. My concern comes from the fact that when I mistakenly installed mine wrong it looked like that before I pulled it off. (Maybe they're just diry though)

2) Overall they look really good... only real problem I could see was on the 2nd to last photo the inside corner closest to the center of the trunk is all messed up. If it's not already full of dirt/dust I'd get a hair dryer/heat gun out immediately and shrink that section down further in hopes that it smoothes out or eliminates the wrinkles.

As for my own car, I actually ordered another set of gloss black overlays (though mine are designed different). They arrived this last Friday. Unfortunately the weather decided to dump another 5.5 inches of snow on us and the temps have dropped back into the mid 30's to mid 40's so it'll be a month or more untill I can install these. Overall nice work though.

 

I ordered these ones on purpose, and yes, the part you mentioned is a bit wrinkly but you cant see it from a distance so I left it as is. I'm just happy that I was able to install them myself and the way they look

But I went ahead and used a hairdryer to smooth that part out, and luckily it smoothed out completely Thanks for the advice dude.

 

Happy to hear it worked out! Also, nice job dude. As someone who screwed up his set I know how you feel on getting them to turn out as good as they did. Glad to hear you're happy with them. At least you didn't install them backwards... LoL. I'll update the status of mine when I finally get a nice enough day to put them on.

 

I wouldn't do that to my car even if they paid me for it

 

Looks good.

B@t