Toyota Tacoma Blinker Conversion
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Vehicle Information:
1996 Toyota Tacoma, manual
transmission, 4WD 3.4L V6. |
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Parts You'll Need: |
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New Sockets
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| Removing Lenses | Removing your old corner lenses is rather simple. There are 2 phillips head screws on the right side of the lenses you'll need to remove. You need to open your hood and there is a black plastic type clip (with a phillips head pattern) near your lenses on the plastic grille. Using your phillips screwdriver, simply unscrew this slightly and it should pop up. With the clip popped 'up' - take your finger and get underneath the entire clip assembly and pop it up from the underside. With this removed, carefully remove your lens. Be careful - wires are attached. Unscrew the entire stock socket and remove. |
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Stock Lenses -
Backside where sockets are installed. You will need to cut this hole bigger to fit the new sockets. |
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Finished Hole -
At first, we tried to find a drill bit (on hand) that would be large enough to make a nice round hole. We couldn't find a bit large enough - so we used the largest bit we could find and finished the hole using a Dremel tool. Use Caution: The plastic wanted to melt when I used the Dremel. Place a piece of a paper towel inside the lens to prevent plastic shavings from getting inside. Also - Only cut a little bit at a time and keep checking the diameter by trying to insert the new sockets. It's better to have a slightly tighter fit. |
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| Check
the Orientation of your new Sockets |
Install the bulbs into the new
sockets. If you haven't already noticed, you can pull the prongs
in & out of the new sockets and change the orientation of
the wiring - this means,there is no way to tell which of the two
wires (red & white)is for each of the filaments (high or low).
So we did some testing. Connect a dummy wire to the ground
tab (crimp end) of the socket and hook it up to something 'ground'
on the truck. Apply current to one of the wires on the socket
from the positive battery terminal. This will let you know
which wire goes for which filament. We chose to make
the red wire our 'high' wattage filament. Whichever you
choose to do - check the other socket and flip the prongs accordingly
to make both sockets the same. *** See note
*** Do not remove bulbs.
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Insert the New Socket
Once you get the hole to the size needed, remove the paper towel & any plastic shavings that may be inside the lens. This is a picture of the new socket inside its new hole, tightly fitted. The hole is just the right size that firmly holds the socket in place rather tightly. This was a 'test' fitting to make sure everything fit well. |
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Adding Sealant:
Since the sockets fit so well -
I pulled the socket out just a bit, enough to apply a good bead
of silicone sealant. Simply push the sockets back down firmly
and the sealant will ooze out slightly forming a nice barrier
that will keep water (and mud) out of your lenses.
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| Wiring Parking Lights - TESTING |
Once your lenses are complete,
the hard part is finished! Now it's time for the wiring.
On my 96 V6 Tacoma, there are two wires going into the parking
lights (Green, White). We tested these wires to discover the GREEN
wire was HOT. I would suggest doing your own tests to verify which
wires are HOT.
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| Wiring
Parking Lights - Ground Wire |
After conducting our tests, we
first made up a new 'ground' wire using some new black wire, crimp
connector & stripped a small amount of insulation at the other
end. Taking this wire, we connected it to the 'ground' tab
on the socket. After stripping a small amount of insulation
off the white (ground) wire on the truck, my husband joined the
black and white exposed wires together and soldered them.
Of course, he covered the exposed areas with electrical tape.
OR- You could simply use a crimp connector directly on the
end of the white ground wire on the truck and connect it to the
ground tab on the socket.
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| Wiring Parking Lights |
Do you remember
which wire was the high (blinker) and which was the low (parking
light)?? On our installation, RED=HIGH and WHITE=LOW. Taking
the GREEN parking light wire and the WHITE wire on our new socket,
my husband soldered them together & covered with electrical
tape. Your new sockets may have crimp connectors on them
already - we choose to cut them off.
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| Wiring Blinkers - Jumping |
On our installation, we decided to leave our original stock blinkers functional for the time being and have a dual blinker set-up. This is what I call 'Jumping' the blinkers. We took some new wire (yellow) and used a 'Tap-In' connector to go into the GREEN stock blinker wire on the truck and ran the yellow wire up to the new socket. Connected the yellow wire to the RED (high wattage) wire on our new sockets. |
| Wiring Blinkers - Directly |
If you do not want a dual blinker
set-up and are getting rid of the stock blinkers completely -
Here's what you should do: Re-direct the wiring sleeve from the
blinkers up to the corner assembly. Connect the GREEN wire
on the blinker to the RED (high wattage filament) wire on the
socket. Since there is already a 'ground' hook-up, there is no
need to connect the white wire (ground) from your blinkers.
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| ****NOTE*** |
When you wired up the new sockets - one of the wires (Red or White) represented the blinkers or the parking lights. However - the bulb also has an orientation for the hi-filament and the low filament. Each time you remove the bulbs, you have a 50% chance of getting that bulb back in the exact orientation it was in when wiring everything up. Take time to mark the bulb and socket so you'll know which way the bulb goes back in. |
| Bulb Replacement |
This write-up has been around for a long time and I haven't had any problems with my blinkers until now. One of my filaments burnt out so I had to replace a bulb. This required removing the entire corner assembly, cutting open the silicone sealant that I had applied, cleaning all the old sealant off, replacing the bulb, and re-attaching the socket with new silicone sealant. Not exacty the easiest or cleanest way of replacing a bulb - but....that's what happens when you want these special little modifications. |
That's It!!
Please - Be Safe - Be Patient - and Good Luck!