i just got some new taillights but they have three bulbs and i dont know what to do to hook the middle bulb up, there are two wires sticking out but i dont know what to do with them. i bought the taillights off ebay and they came with no directions... here are some pics of the two wires



so does anyone know how to hook up the middle bulb?

 

hows is it setup?
1. reverse
2. blinker
3. brake

?

 

aight pimp here's what you need:

wire clamps
either a wire crimper or needle nose pliers

You have the option of making the middle light a brake light or signal light it's your choice.

first you need to get the wire clamps that will allow you to clamp into a wire that is already running. i got the blue ones from radioshack for like $2. yo have three wires running within your clamp, clamp the black with the black and then you have a major wire = signal and a minor wire = brake. pick which one you want and clamp the red wire to it and that's it

 

id hook that wire into an idependent strobe and use that for your purposes. itll be great. or you could use it for another blinker by hooking it into that harness, brake light, or just a light that turns on when you turn your lights on.

 

Not so. On a 2002, using the wires available at the taillight, he has the choice of making it either a nighttime running light or a combination stop/turn light. Each stop light and turn signal are the same wire and filament on a 2002.



To use them as stop/turn lights:

Left side:
Red tapped to Light Green / Orange
Black tapped to black

Right side:
Red tapped to Orange / Light Blue
Black tapped to black



OR To use them as nighttime running lights:

Both sides:
Red tapped to Brown
Black tapped to black

 

Correct. I converted my 03 to one bulb for tailight/brake light, and one bulb for turn signal only, and it required 3 new wires run from the cab back to the taillights. (I could have run only one wire and did some splicing up in the cab, but its easier to reverse this way.)

 

couldn't you just cut the signal wire and splice it into the third light instead of running new wires? you already have a ground wire all you would have to do is cut the Major wire and connect it to the new bulb...or no?

 

NOPE!

There are 5 wires:

1) ground
2) taillight
3) reverse light
4) combination brake/left turn signal
5) combination brake/right turn signal


The ground, reverse, and taillight wires you can re-use, but if you want the brake light and the turn signal to be seperate bulbs (my turn signals are amber) then you need to run 3 wires:

1) left turn signal
2) right turn signal
3) brake

Obviously the ground, taillight, and reverse split off to both taillights. The new brake line will also split off to both taillights, and the turn signals will obviously only go to their respective sides.


edit: Since the 3rd bulb on those taillights is a single-stage bulb, what I might do is wire it up as a taillight, but with a ground-interrupt like the front blinker mod, so that you'll get a cool flashing effect with the turn signal on (when the taillights are also on.) Thats what I would do if I had taillights with 2 red sections.