tail light replacement

[alvin stadel]

I know this has been talked about before but can not find the discussion. Are 63 galaxy tail lights the same size as 57's? I have a source for 63 nos tail lights but wanted to make sure they will interchange before I buy them. take care, Alvin

[RICH MUISE]

Same size? not exactly, the 63 tailights are about 1/2" smaller on the diameter.
Interchange? Not exactly, aside from being a different diameter screw hole diameter bolt pattern,lol,(I'm guessing...almost would have to be), the '57 tailights are 3 holes and the '63 are four holes.
After I did mine, I read that this swap was a popular one back in the 60's. I have no idea what they did back then to mount the lenses or to fill in the 1/4" or so gap around the edges. I do not know if there is enough flange around the '57 tailight bucket to allow additional holes to be added to match the '63 pattern. An educated guess would be there is not. The '63 lenses are reproduced, mine are reproductions.

There is a difference between '63 Galaxie lenses and '63 Galaxie 500XL lenses. Mine are the 500XL, and have the 4 fins on the brightwork. I believe the plainer Galaxie lenses are the same except without the 4 fins. Also, I am not sure if the Galaxie lenses have the center back up lenses.

When I did mine, I converted a beat up set of '63 tailight buckets to fit the '57, and I found a really neat way of easily making s.s. trim rings to fill the gap. I used stainless dog dish bowls!! I've got a ton of pics of the whole process including making the rings (10 bucks or so !!), and the bucket modifications, but they are in my old computer that I still need to get up and running so I can download all that stuff. It was really a fun project, and if you are going to do it, I'll get my butt in gear and dig out all the old pics.
Rich

[alvin stadel]

thanks Rich, I think I'll give it a try as I really like the looks of them on your car.  Take care, Alvin

[RICH MUISE]

Ha, found my old thread I did on this project.........
http://57fordsforever.com/smf/index.php?topic=2025.msg10668#msg10668

Any questions, just ask.
Just to clarify..........note the comment about the 4 screws being long. The idea was for the screws to hold the lens and gasket to the bucket with the weldnuts on the backside, and enough thread left for those screws to then pass thru holes drilled in the '57's body tailight surround, and a second set of nuts to hold everything to the body. This means of course when the lens is removed, it is done by removing the nuts on those 4 screws from inside the trunk, not unscrewing from outside as you normally would. Also, care has to be taken when drilling those 4 holes, as that is what is going to align the 4 fins on the lens.