Hi all.

Hopefully someone can enlighten me on this, I reversed into a window ledge and cracked one of my tail lights on my Mk II Combi.

I'm thinking of replacing the two units now with the facelifted ones. Will they fit straight on? I know there were sheet metal changes at the front

of the car for the facelift but I don't think there were any changes made to the rear bodywork?

Cheers

Its a straight swap, BUT the facelift lights do not have the integrated reflector on the cluster. What that means in reality is that you will have to also fit reflectors to the rear of the car, since its illegal and against the lighting regulations to not have reflectors on the rear of the car. This is why the facelift has the vRS style rear bumper with reflectors contained in the bumper.

Its a straight swap, BUT the facelift lights do not have the integrated reflector on the cluster. What that means in reality is that you will have to also fit reflectors to the rear of the car, since its illegal and against the lighting regulations to not have reflectors on the rear of the car. This is why the facelift has the vRS style rear bumper with reflectors contained in the bumper.

Aha! very good point. I wonder do the NCT (MOT) crowd here check that. I'll need to look into it. Thanks.

Do it, and just temporarily use those crap looking stick on reflectors when NCT'ing it........ pull them off again after :p

Do it, and just temporarily use those crap looking stick on reflectors when NCT'ing it........ pull them off again after :p

Thereby advocating that you drive illegally 364 days per year (or 365 if it's a leap year).....................very sensible :no:

Thereby advocating that you drive illegally 364 days per year (or 365 if it's a leap year).....................very sensible :no:

Hey chill out! It's not like I'm recommending driving with no brakes or something!

It's just that our equivalent of your MOT-the "NCT" is a bit of a farce-your car can fail its test simply because it doesn't have the county it was registered in displayed in the Irish language in 10mm high lettering on the reg plate....

I like the way you're thinking VeryRed, was thinking of doing that and then eventually fitting the FL rear bumper.

@Brimma, its different over here, rules and regulations are treated more as "guidlines" you're never going to get pulled by the fuzz for not having rear reflectors.

Hey chill out! It's not like I'm recommending driving with no brakes or something!

It's just that our equivalent of your MOT-the "NCT" is a bit of a farce-your car can fail its test simply because it doesn't have the county it was registered in displayed in the Irish language in 10mm high lettering on the reg plate....

My dad moved to ireland 8 years ago & he says the nct(every 2 years) on his 2000 ford focus is more through than the mots he used to get in england.I repair his focus for him(have from new) & he was speaking to a nct tester & they say they check every thing & if in doubt it fails! i have seen the advisery list they send my dad every now & again to make sure the faults are fixed by next nct & some are not even covered by our mot.

I did exactly the same thing on my 2008 Scout.

It seems the old versus new tail light splits opinion.

Fortunately the Scout has the reflective strips in the bumper. Though to be fair it would take a very keen MOT tester to realise that they were missing. Especially when you consider there are lots of car’s that have weird and wonderful ways of incorporating the compulsory red reflector in to their lenses.

Personally I prefer the cleaner look, besides as you say the differences on the FL compared to the pre-FL at the back of the car is limited to the tail lights and font of the 'Octavia' badge (so I changed that too!).

Some may think it's vain, but I like the fact that my car looks like a FL from the rear :yes:

Edited 3 November, 201015 yr by silver1011

Nice job Silver, nice car too. thanks for the pics.