DIY yellow fog light covers / vinyl / laminx
#1
Member
Thread Starter
DIY yellow fog light covers / vinyl / laminx
I've come across a bit of a problem when trying put on a circular cut yellow
vinyl / laminx cover for my fog lights. My fog lights are round but the glass
is not flat like on some cars. It's convex (or contoured)? So if I cut out a circular shape for
my fog light, when applying it, it doesn't stick on smoothly. There's just tons of
wrinkles and folds. If I sucessfully smooth out one side of the fogs, the other side is all wrinkled again. Then I go and smooth that out and the other side now has wrinkles. The problem seems to be that there is too much vinyl!
I hope you understand what I'm trying to say. A perfectly flat circle being put onto a convex shaped circle won't fit. The convex/contoured circle has seems to have a different surface area due to its rounded shape and not just being flat.
How do I get around this? How do the others do it? I saw many videos on how to install and they just stick it on easily and press it down from the center on out eliminating the bubbles with a little plastic card or squeegee.
vinyl / laminx cover for my fog lights. My fog lights are round but the glass
is not flat like on some cars. It's convex (or contoured)? So if I cut out a circular shape for
my fog light, when applying it, it doesn't stick on smoothly. There's just tons of
wrinkles and folds. If I sucessfully smooth out one side of the fogs, the other side is all wrinkled again. Then I go and smooth that out and the other side now has wrinkles. The problem seems to be that there is too much vinyl!
I hope you understand what I'm trying to say. A perfectly flat circle being put onto a convex shaped circle won't fit. The convex/contoured circle has seems to have a different surface area due to its rounded shape and not just being flat.
How do I get around this? How do the others do it? I saw many videos on how to install and they just stick it on easily and press it down from the center on out eliminating the bubbles with a little plastic card or squeegee.
#2
My question is why do you want to do it. If you check, yellow fog lights do not work any better than white. If they did, the manufacturers would put them on their cars. Still in doubt, ask the car talk guys.
#3
If the glass is bowed or convex then you do have too much product. How about using a heat gun to get it to shrink on the lights as you are applying it.
#4
Member
Thread Starter
Yeah, I'm going to use the hair dryer as all the videos have shown...i just don't get how it's supposed to fit on smoothly because of the contoured shape foglight. It's as if I have to make "cut" line down one side just to release all the "build up" of material wrinkles.
Oh, and why I want to do this? It's not for functional reasons. I know that yellow fogs or blue fogs or green fogs aren't necessarily more visible or better than just clear white ones. The ONLY reason why I want to do it is for style/looks and the color accents my car color nicely too. It's also a very cheap/inexpensive modification to do and it is 100% reversible.
Oh, and why I want to do this? It's not for functional reasons. I know that yellow fogs or blue fogs or green fogs aren't necessarily more visible or better than just clear white ones. The ONLY reason why I want to do it is for style/looks and the color accents my car color nicely too. It's also a very cheap/inexpensive modification to do and it is 100% reversible.
#5
Member
Thread Starter
after doing a bit more research, I believe I found out the key to affixing laminx/vinyl cover over contoured foglights. You have to heat the vinyl using a hair dryer so that it becomes more flexible and then stretch it out to get rid of the bubbles and wrinkles.
I always thought it was just a simple "stick it on" sort of thing but I guess with round contoured shaped lights, the key is to actually "stretch" it like an elastic band. It'll only stretch enough if u heat with a hair dryer ...stretches easily ...but once it cools down it gets really hard again and difficult to stretch it. So it requires 2 ppl to do this. 1 person has to hair dry it (heat it) while the other person has to use 2 hands and stretch it out to get the most sealed air tight fit.
I always thought it was just a simple "stick it on" sort of thing but I guess with round contoured shaped lights, the key is to actually "stretch" it like an elastic band. It'll only stretch enough if u heat with a hair dryer ...stretches easily ...but once it cools down it gets really hard again and difficult to stretch it. So it requires 2 ppl to do this. 1 person has to hair dry it (heat it) while the other person has to use 2 hands and stretch it out to get the most sealed air tight fit.
#6
I wasn't thinking about ornamental / decoration.
Back in the day we hung large fuzzy dice from the rear view mirror and put purple dot lenses on the tail lights.
Back in the day we hung large fuzzy dice from the rear view mirror and put purple dot lenses on the tail lights.
#7
Member
Thread Starter
yeah the good ol days. I remember people would put fur IN the car upholstery and also even fur on the outside of the car. Nice mods.