Solving this issue has been on my list for a while, and I bought an LED unit off e-bay before Christmas. There's also been a run of chat on Mogtalk recently about driving in France and the conclusion seems to be that if the centre brake light is fitted, it must not be obscured by luggage and must work. There are those who remove the centre brake light to maintain the Trad look, but I wouldn't do this for two reasons. First is that the high level brake light might just make the difference between being rear-ended or not. The second reason is that any modification from standard must be notified to your insurer. The truth is that this probably makes no difference, but I wouldn't want to find out that it did after a rear end shunt. Anyway, that's Dave's sermon over for today, so on with the plan.
First job was to remove the luggage carrier and spare wheel. While the spare was off the car I put 30psi in it. Much easier than when it's on the car.
My plan was to unplug the light and leave the car loom unaltered. This is the plug, just under the stalk. It has a simple securing clip and comes apart easily.
The stalk is secured with four wood screws. Not surprising really, but I would have fitted them a bit straighter........
Once off, I found the chassis number 'chalked' on the base. More like Tippex really. Note the rough top edge, and I had assumed that this stalk was plastic. It's metal.
This photo shows how the cables run down in a slot, and should be compared with the next picture - after fettling.
So now we see a black neoprene plug under the lamp, to keep damp at bay, and red insulating tape stuck over the wires, just to make it tidier. You can also see the white plug which I've put in to allow a second set of wires to run to the luggage high level lamp. All connections have been soldered. It's a while since I had the soldering iron out, so I quite enjoyed that. It's very relaxing.
I have had to switch from Firefox to Internet Explorer as my right click paste function still doesn't work in Firefox. Odd eh?
More to follow>>>>>>>
