I have been looking for an original pair of '39 tail lights for my Model A hot rod build... and cannot for the life of me tell which ones are vintage, and which ones are repops. A guy tried to sell me a pair and swore that they were original. They looked old, had some rust on the buckets, but then I noticed that they had faded "Made in..." stickers on them, I set them back on the table. These tail lights are one of those things that there are probably more repop ones out there than surviving originals! So my question is, how can you tell? What are the differences in the buckets, lenses and bezels? Your help is much appreciated! Sam
I can’t remember ever seeing an original with a nice clean, unrusted bucket. See if the ferrule holding the fabric wire conduit is crusty. Seems the original rings usually have nice clean edges with a crisp cut. Some of the repros have a sloppy edge next to the lense.
JMO, but the second example has wiring that for sure smacks of aftermarket, but even the first one could be and likely is reproduction also. Even so, the cloth covered wiring and cloth sleeve around it says to me that it’s a quality repro.
True... but I am really trying to use as much original stuff on this car as possible. It's one of those "If these parts could talk" things... I guess with any build, we put constraints in place. I think it's the challenge of it that helps to keep me motivated. Sam
yeah, if they look like that (85 years of aging), then they're original. Maybe. Crusty cloth wiring is a big clue.
First photo shows blue dots, - were they original to 1939? I thought blue dots were a later hot rodding thing ? I would think that all the photos you showed are repop, although hard to say on the lens in the last photo. Is the original lens perhaps more rounded ? Interesting that the conduit in post 7 looks welded to main housing. None of your lights look quite like those in post 7
I just went through this. I found a set a guy just removed from an original car to install LEDs (fucking yuck). They had cloth wire looms and cloth wire. As far as I know the repops all come with modern wire.
I will throw this out there all the originals probably don't look the same used for several years & made all over the country
The original rims look much different from the reproduction ones. Look at how the rim curves to the lens. Depending on whose reproduction lights you may have, some of the reproduction lenses are much narrower on the somewhat straight sides.
I see all these old replacement tailight lenses at swap meets and they are really old, not made Ford but unquestionably old so what does it matter?
I just like the challenge of finding all nice original parts and the authenticity they bring to the build. Most people won’t care, and I don’t blab about how there’s few if any repop parts on my cars. It’s just something I like, it’s fun for me and is just part of my enjoyment of the hobby. Some people don’t care and there cars are awesome too and that’s fine.
I'm with you guys on this. Maybe it's from growing up attending swap meets with my dad, but one of the best parts of the build process is tracking down as many nice original parts as possible.
Aside from the hunt for OE, I bet another part is the pricing. If every set in the meet is 5 bucks, you want the OE instead of the repop. When it gets into a price difference, then you need to know what you are looking at and if it's a repop at OE price or an OE at repop price. Is the seller unaware or lying? It pays to be an informed buyer.
That's one thing I notices as well. The original bezels have a slight bend into the lens, and fit nice... whereas the repops are flat.
Are those pop rivets? Pop rivets weren’t in widespread use outside of aircraft until after WW2. If you look at the other ones further up they seem to have a normal pressed rivet.
You can find them either way. I picked up some NORS ones at the swap meet a couple months ago that were glass and looked just like originals.
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