Hello,

I spent too much time changing my tail light fixtures on my 08 coupe this past weekend. I could find nothing online to help me, so I struggled through it. I hope this saves others some time.

This is annoying but you ARE going to have to take off the bumper to do this. (ridiculous I know, but it's a must)

1) If you have the mud guards behing the back wheels, you need to take those off. There should be 3 phillips head screws. This part is no problem. And while you have them off. Take a few minutes to clean them. It's a rare chance to give them a good cleaning.

2) There are 2 screws in each wheel well holding the bumper to the car. One is right above the top screw on the mud guard, or about half we up the wheel well, right on the outside edge. The other screw is screwed upwards at the top back edge of the wheel well.

3) Under the back of the car there are 2 plugs holding the bumper to the plastic under carriage thing. Use a flat head screw driver to pop them out, then they just basically fall out.

4) Now you can start un clipping the bumper. All along the top seam there are clips. Pull the part clost to the wheel well out a bit. You can then see one of the tabs holding the bumper on. Push it down and back with a screw driver. Once the first one is off, the rest just kinda fall off pretty easily.

5) Last there are 2 allen wrench screws on either either side of the trunk opening. Those are the last things holding the bumper on. Now the bumper comes off and be careful, it's flimsy and fragile.

6) Now you can see why you needed to take the bumper off. The tail lights are screwed onto flanges that attach to the car. Unscrew the 2 bolts on each on that connect it to the car. And unscrew the flange from the tail light fixture.

7) Inside the trunk you need to peel back the wall of the trunk. There are 3 plastic flat head screws on each side of the trunk. Take them off and then the cover just peels back.

8) Un plug the wires and there are 4 bolts securing the fixture to the car. Unscrew those and the light fixture comes off very easiliy.

9) Swap your bulbs.(Note that one of my bulbs is basically impossible to change with the fixture on the car. So put the bulbs in before you put the new fixture on, just to be safe.)

10) Put the new tail lights on in reverse order. Make sure the fixture lines up with the car body properly. The flange that attaches to the car can slide side to side. So manuever until the lights are flush, then tighten it down. Otherwise you'll have the tips of the lights protruding from the side of the car. (very ricy) You may have to put some washers behind the flange to get the correct fit. I put 3 small washers on each bolt behind the flange. Mine are sitting nice like that.

11) If you got LED tail lights like I did. the wiring probably isn't correct. My new lights had 2 black, 1 green and 1 red wire. the car had 1 green, one red, and one black. To get them to work properly, I attached the green light wire, to the cars red wire. The cars green wire, to the light fixtures red wire. And one of the black to the black. The extra black wire i just taped off. (Also, if you happen to blow a fuse(which I did on accident) it is a 7.5 amp fuse in slot #26 under the dash, the backup to that is a 10 amp in slot 30)

14) The bumper goes on very easily. Just pop it back on and put the screws in.

I think I included everything that tripped me up. Hopefully this saved you some time.

Feel free to PM me for advice. I would be glad to help anybody out.

 

nice write up.

 

Thanks!

 

all that just to remove the tailight! $hit! Tell me i don't have to do all that to replace a bulb?

 

Just the part about peeling back the wall inside teh trunk. The bulbs just pop out like any other car. It's just a lot of work to replace the fixtures.