CUTTING HEADLIGHT BUCKETS FOR IMPORVED TURNING RADIUS

1) I like to cut a little as possible out of the headight buckets. Start small and trim the opening as needed, until you can turn the tire past the headlight buckets. 

2) After you have the enough material removed from the bucket, slide a piece of steel behind the bucket and mark the shape of the opening on it. When you cut out the patch cut it 1/8" - 1/4" large. 

3) Now weld it in, I like to leave the tire turned and use it to hold the patch in place. You'll have to hammer some of the edges of the patch to get it to fit just right. You can weld/grind the whole patch if you like, but since I'm a hack, I'll just tack it in and seam seal the rest.

Part II:

Sometimes with cut headlight buckets, the back of the headlights will hit the new patch piece and ground out. To fix this problem I do a couple different things. The first is to unsolder, flaten, and re-solder the terminals on the back of the headlight. Then on the wire harness remove the spade connectors from the black plastic plug. 

Then on the headlight buckets I like to position the headlights differently. Normaly the headlight is held into the back of the bucket with clips. For more clearance I re-position the headlight to the front of this piece and glue it into place. You could section and weld the buckets so that the clips would hold the headlights...but this is a trashy driver I'm building, and I'm not too concerned with "whats right" or how it looks.....This works and thats what matters. 

texto y fotos por: franz, desde: 
KUSTOM COACH WERKS