Possibly mildly crazy idea for a (totally reversible) 3rd brake light on a Spitfire…?

[DVD3500]

Hi Folks,

(For the TLDR folks jump to the IDEA section)
Here in Germany LED lights (except certain headlights) are verboten so simply swapping out the brake lights for something brighter is not an option. Adding a 3^rd brake light though is legal.

I have a Körbler targa hardtop so that is easy. Lots of kits where I can add that in the rear window. What about when I want to go topless? (the car for pete’s sake…)

As I near getting my car’s body and chassis painted I started thinking about improving rear visibility as we have had no less than 3 fatal rear-end crashes in the area in the past few weeks.

I had toyed with the idea of eliminating part of the chrome trim on the lip of the trunk/boot and replacing it with a thin LED brake light. Problem was the lid is curved so the light would not be very big and not being curved would look a bit half-donkeyed….

I was thinking about the fuel cap, for example a ring that clamps on the fuel cap and then attach a light to it somehow. However the rules here in Deutschland mean you would have to affix it with “tools” so any time the cap needed to be opened or used would be a pain. (I also could not find a way to make it not look like E.T. with a 100° fever…)

Then while on a very boring conference call I had a brain wave!

IDEA (TLDR=too long didn’t read)

The rear of the convertible top/hood is attached to the car by 2 ½” bolts on a strip of metal. I could fashion a thin strip of metal would slide under the  mounting frame out the back and using 90° angles I could mount a 3^rd brake light between the top/hood and the fuel filler.

I t may be slightly obscured by the fuel cap but that’s OK I think as 96.30894% of all drivers are looking down on a Spitfire anyway…

This has the advantage that I could fashion a plug inside the car and swap it when I put the hard top on (you are only allowed one central brake light) as well as being total reversible.

Any gaps caused by the extra strip of metal could be mitigated with weather stripping.

Since that part of the car is not subject to high winds the metal could be very thin, like .2 or .3 mm I reckon. In fact, it probably has to be thin to conform to the lip around the tub where the top/hood is mounted.

Whadaya think?

[Dannyb]

Go for it. Then post some pics.

Danny

Ps. Would it be legal to have a 3rd brake light on the inside of the rear soft top window.

[Dannyb]

Mind you that won't help with the hood down.

Danny

[Kevin R]

You can be very unlucky as there are plenty of idiots around but there are many ways to drive defensively to substantially reduce the risk of being rear-ended.  Usually the rear-enders and rear-ended meet for the first time exchanging insurance details.

[DVD3500]

On 27/10/2023 at 16:47, Dannyb said:

Go for it. Then post some pics.

Danny

Ps. Would it be legal to have a 3rd brake light on the inside of the rear soft top window.

It would be legal and a piece of cake but as you say when going topless you are hiding the best bits!

That sounds very weird to me.. 😄

I have actually found someone who has already done it, more or less. He has the light crammed behind the filler cap so I am thinking of maybe raising it all 2-3 cm (1 to 1.5 inches to the rest of us..) and moving it back a bit for clearance of the filler cap.

Have to of course make sure the top/hood can be easily raised and lowered....

This is the first time I wish I had not scrapped the other body I had. I could have poked and prodded to my heart's content...

 

Edited October 30, 2023 by DVD3500

[Batch]

Hi

Does the third brake light have to ve mounted centrally? I have seen a couple of TR6's with a third brake light mounted on the deck adjacent to the filler cap on the drivers side. They were covered by a neat fairing which finished it off nicely. This should be possible on a spitfire and would.

Dave

Edited October 30, 2023 by Batch
missing text

[DVD3500]

It has to be "higher" than the original brake lights and it has to be "central". I don't think it has to be perfectly centered as I have seen some delivery vans that have this weird tear drop light that is more on one door than the other.

Methinks the logic is that, in general, cars are not wider than 2 meters so if the regular lights are out you can guess that 1 or so meters either side of the light would be safe to pass... That does require the person to be applying the brakes though so not sure if that is really all that helpful..?

On a tangent, whenever I have work done on/in/around the house and they explain to me something has to be certain way I usually ask (in a very Arthur Dent way) why it has to be done that way.

Here in Germany they usually do in fact know why. I put it down to the very thorough apprenticeship schemes they have here. 

One exception was at a friend's house where he was having tiling done. The tiler insisted they remove the countertop so he could put up the tiles behind it. When I pointed out that the countertop was perfectly level and plumb and there was no risk of things looking off he begrudgingly admitted that that method worked...

Similarly when our dish washer packed up they tried to charge us extra for a "difficult extraction". We had laid laminate down on top of some of the world's ugliest tiles and they claimed getting the dish wash over this 3 mm ledge was "hard".

A small car jack was more than enough to move it... and they didn't charge extra...