Tourer Rear Light Securing Bracket Mod

[Arctic]

This thread is mainly for the tourer owners but also a worth while read as you never know you may one day decide to own a R75 or MGZT-T tourer.
I think most tourer owners have at one time had to change a bulb in the rear light cluster only to come across a nightmare when removing the light and finding out your rear light bracket is cracked or broken top and bottom or just one maybe, the ones with the screw/bolt behind the little black flap,
then you also have the ball & socket fixing the other side of the light which can break on removing or re-fitting as these are a tight fit to tight really so i have devised a little reinforcement mod for the said brackets with photo's as per usual.

The first thing i did was to obtain a spare pair of lights i could work on, not only for the future should one get a broken lens etc, but also i did not want to take mine off because of using the car.

Right once you have your light off or your spare if you have one, is to clean the face of the bracket and give it a good key as in Fig 1 below this will help when you glue the modified bracket/washer etc.
1

Make sure you do both top and bottom securing brackets even if they are in good condition, then you will not suffer them being broken in the future(my opinion only) Fig 2
2

My first thought was to use stainless steel washers on both top and bottom brackets as here in Fig 3 this would be fine if the brackets were whole not damaged, but if cracked or the fixing hole partially broken away mainly the top fixing bracket would just not be enough in my opinion.
3

Therefore i needed to find something which would be more supportive along the whole bracket rather than just round the hole for the bolt which if over tightened cracks the plastic so i made a support bracket for it as here in Fig 4/5/6
4

5

6

I made these out of galvanised plates which came from the back of an old PC which are used to block off the rear sections which you can add different board cards Fig 7 these were cut and bent to shape which was easy being quite pliable but yet strong enough for the bracket to be reinforced.
7

The bottom bracket being small in height tend not to split but the fixing hole can break for this i used the stainless steel washer on both sides again this is only going to be any good if you have enough of the bracket to glue to, if not i would have used the plate again but a smaller piece Fig 8.
8

Here you can see both top and bottom brackets with the support mods in place also note the ball socket fixing points which we will come to later in the thread Fig 9/10
9

10

At this stage i came inside from the shed as it was getting quite chilly to carry on with the modification, on the brackets and ball socket fixings below you can see the plastic sockets which the male ball joint fits into these are so shallow yet very tight they are a nightmare trying to either pull the light from the car body or push back in when refitting after changing a bulb, you can also see in the photo what i intend to use in replace of these sockets yes a good old plaster board rawlplug Fig 11
11

These rawlplugs fit just right not to tight but enough to give a good grip and best of all the ball sockets pop in and out easy below both fixed into place Fig 12
12

I used a size 10 rawlplug on the bottom socket as this is longer and will push further into a size 10 plug note the barbs on the plug which should hole into the car body Fig 13
13

The top socket i used a size 8 as this socket is not so long with the size 8 plug you do have to open it a little first which is easy use a posidrive screw driver just to tease it open Fig 14
14

Here in Fig 15 you have a side view of all the fixing points and the modifications to the them.
15

This is a view of the bottom screw/bolt fixing without the outside stainless steel washer in my opinion not strong enough one needed to be added Fig 16
16

Top fixing point without the outside stainless steel washer Fig 17
17

This is a lot better top and bottom screw/bolt fixing points now have the stainless steel outer washer making it strong enough to have the screw tightened up with worrying if it will crack the plastic Fig 18/19
18
bottom point
19
Ready for a test fitting one of the days this week Fig 20
20

This modification will work even if all the end of the fixing hole as broken away you would just have to use the galvinised bracket on both top and bottom, the hole size drilled into the plate is 6mm if you have lights with out broken brackets it may be wise to do this stronger fix before it happens that way you may get away with using just the stainless steel washers 6mm hole and outer 12mm.

To fix the washers and supporting plates to the lights i have for now used double side tape just for the test once i know it is ok as is and doe's not need adjusting i will fix with liquid metal bond, i will add the fitting once it as be finalised. cheers Arctic.


Disclaimer:
You are responsible for any work or modifications carried out on your car and you undertake any such work at your own risk.
The 75 and ZT Owners Club nor the original author of this How-To can be held liable for anything that may happen as a result
of you following this How-To.