B8.5 custom tail light diary

[Drunktank]

Dear diary, it's day one of a new project - custom tail lights, including blacked out inner housings, sequential turn signals, start up sequence, and a show mode. Audi tails are pretty ridiculous to even try this on for a first time, including added difficulty of being 4-piece lights and being ultrasonic welded together.

As far as I know, there are no aftermarket lights for our cars, so OEM is the only option. If I get the inevitable "how much to make me a set" after this is done, remember that you're already in the hole $800+ before you've even done a thing.

Tomorrow we start cutting!

[2by2handsofblue]

Damn. I want to get this done. Maybe u will offer some to do some in the future?



we are the borg! resistance is futile.

[2by2handsofblue]

What is ultrasonic welding by the way?

Fyi I'm definitely following

we are the borg! resistance is futile.

[hmc2261]

What is ultrasonic welding by the way?

Fyi I'm definitely following

we are the borg! resistance is futile.

It’s done with a machine that uses an acoustic stack, and fixture and a horn.
The horn and fixture hold the two parts together and the acoustic stack sends ultrasonic waves through the horn causing the top part to vibrate.
At the surfaces of the two parts that are touching they vibrate so fast, they heat up and melt together.
Then they are joined, so “welded”

Sorry for the essay, I dealt with that process in my last job.


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[2by2handsofblue]

It’s done with a machine that uses an acoustic stack, and fixture and a horn.
The horn and fixture hold the two parts together and the acoustic stack sends ultrasonic waves through the horn causing the top part to vibrate.
At the surfaces of the two parts that are touching they vibrate so fast, they heat up and melt together.
Then they are joined, so “welded”

Sorry for the essay, I dealt with that process in my last job.


Sent from my iPhone using Audizine

No. Tha is for the explanation. Nothing wrong with some education.
I had an idea what is a ultrasonic does. Didnt realize u can meld plastic together like that

we are the borg! resistance is futile.

[Drunktank]

Dear Diary, day 2 has come and gone and we put the ultrasonic knife to good use. There's a nice channel in the Audi lights to follow, and overall it wasn't too problematic.




This made for much cleaner cuts and less stock removed than a dremel, which should hopefully lead to going back together easier (no idea how i'll do this yet). This week we'll start disassembling and see what we're dealing with.

[Coderedpl]

Looks fun, following

I remember my adventures with permasealed lights before anything was available to take them apart easier. Needless to say it didn't go well.

[2by2handsofblue]

How about making YouTube video of sorts

we are the borg! resistance is futile.

[btb.tyler09]

Best of luck. I hope you get this to work. You've already done a much better job disassembling the lights than I did. Do you already know how to recode the tails and where to tap in for the additional wire for the turn signal? That held me back, but I think I found the solution over in the Ross tech forum and in the wiring diagrams from Audi. Just haven't had time to go back to this project.

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[Drunktank]

Got a chance to disassemble one side of lights today. There's no individual wiring for LED's, they're all on 7 different circuit boards, so there's no reusing the factory LED's. The boards also curve with the lights, so you can't use strips, as they won't bend sideways.

Soooo, it looks like we're going to be making board replacements for these. I have a bit of experience making custom Arduino's and such in Kicad, but I'll need to re-familiarize myself with it. If anyone is ever interested learning about PCB's, Sean Hymel has a great Kicad tutorial series on Youtube.

I can get down to 3 boards per side if I just do the brake lights, and ignore the running lights. I don't really see any reason to mess with the running lights for this. The plan is to start by sticking the boards in a flatbed scanner so I can use the board shape to make the new ones. I've already snipped off the components of the board so it will sit nice and flat on the scanner.

Do you already know how to recode the tails and where to tap in for the additional wire for the turn signal?

I was thinking about that the other day, and I don't have any re-coding tools, and don't really care to get one. I was thinking I'll interface with the harness for the sidemarker turn signals and the 3rd brake light to get individual signals for each.

I've never understood why just because you CAN have your brake light double as a turn signal in the States, why you WOULD? Especially since you separate them by default in other countries. Why make it more complicated? Who knows.

[btb.tyler09]

Got a chance to disassemble one side of lights today. There's no individual wiring for LED's, they're all on 7 different circuit boards, so there's no reusing the factory LED's. The boards also curve with the lights, so you can't use strips, as they won't bend sideways.

Soooo, it looks like we're going to be making board replacements for these. I have a bit of experience making custom Arduino's and such in Kicad, but I'll need to re-familiarize myself with it. If anyone is ever interested learning about PCB's, Sean Hymel has a great Kicad tutorial series on Youtube.

I can get down to 3 boards per side if I just do the brake lights, and ignore the running lights. I don't really see any reason to mess with the running lights for this. The plan is to start by sticking the boards in a flatbed scanner so I can use the board shape to make the new ones. I've already snipped off the components of the board so it will sit nice and flat on the scanner.





I was thinking about that the other day, and I don't have any re-coding tools, and don't really care to get one. I was thinking I'll interface with the harness for the sidemarker turn signals and the 3rd brake light to get individual signals for each.

I've never understood why just because you CAN have your brake light double as a turn signal in the States, why you WOULD? Especially since you separate them by default in other countries. Why make it more complicated? Who knows.

You can use factory LEDs if your willing to cut the traces on the PCB. Designing a custom PCB would be sweet though. Been trying to convince an EE friend to do it for me.20200827_140152.jpeg

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[Drunktank]

So I got into the office to use the scanner. Very strange stepping foot into there again, haven't been in there since March. i got some scans of the boards, and then cleaned them up in inkscape, where I could then export as a DXF file, which is what Kicad needs for a board shape file. Time to start designing some boards! Need to find suitable LED's resistors, headers, etc. etc. and then get them all designed on the boards.

You can use factory LEDs if your willing to cut the traces on the PCB. Designing a custom PCB would be sweet though. Been trying to convince an EE friend to do it for me

Interesting! I hadn't thought about that and obviously the factory LED's are very robust. From what I've seen with my lights here, there wouldn't actually be room for the wires. The plastic reflectors that sandwich the board practically touch it. have you been able reassemble without getting those wires pinched? It looks delicate.

[btb.tyler09]

So I got into the office to use the scanner. Very strange stepping foot into there again, haven't been in there since March. i got some scans of the boards, and then cleaned them up in inkscape, where I could then export as a DXF file, which is what Kicad needs for a board shape file. Time to start designing some boards! Need to find suitable LED's resistors, headers, etc. etc. and then get them all designed on the boards.






Interesting! I hadn't thought about that and obviously the factory LED's are very robust. From what I've seen with my lights here, there wouldn't actually be room for the wires. The plastic reflectors that sandwich the board practically touch it. have you been able reassemble without getting those wires pinched? It looks delicate.

This is great. nice work. Since it may be helpful, i used these amber LEDs for the top row.
https://www.mouser.com/ProductDetail...M4BAKWCWBXB353

They have red ones too since you are replacing those. i think i ended up with 150 ohm resistors, but not entirely sure.

And yeah, i got it back together. The wires are glued to the pcb, so they don't move much. My problem was getting the tail light apart cleanly my first attempt was with a dremel and was terrible. Second time i tried to be more careful with a combination of temp swings and an xacto blade, but i cracked the lens on that one. I haven't touched this project in a year now, but would like to get back on it.

[Drunktank]

It took every spare moment of the last week, but I have the boards designed for one full side. I reeeeally hope there's some way to mirror this for the other side(and that other side is actually a mirror of these), because i really don't want to do this again. Parts are on the way along with the microcontrollers. Time to send the boards out to be made!

[Drunktank]

Boards are in. Still waiting on a few components to arrive that show slightly back ordered from Digikey. The mounting holes are close to being perfect, but make for a really tight fit. I'm going to make some minor adjustments on those and order some more boards so they fit perfectly while I wait for the other parts.

[btb.tyler09]

If you will consider selling a diy set of these boards, I'd buy them today.

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[Quattro_Gang]

Are you going to be showing the final product?

[briceportier]

Looks very very promising!
Here's what a friend did with the front ones: https://www.facebook.com/groups/audi...8806483285052/

[blackfunk]

No. Tha is for the explanation. Nothing wrong with some education.
I had an idea what is a ultrasonic does. Didnt realize u can meld plastic together like that

we are the borg! resistance is futile.

Here's one for you. Apparently you can now do the same with different types of metals i.e. Aluminum and Steel - I was watching a documentary recently where they were talking about this sort of stuff - can't remember the exact metals used only that they were different. I thought that was pretty cool. Now back to the surgery of the OP.

[Drunktank]

Work has been eating my soul lately, but I should probably be grateful to have a job in the current state of things. Anyway, slow and steady progress. I got the first board soldered up and tested. Threw it in a housing just to see what it looks like. Next up will be get the other adjacent light soldered up and on another controller, and then try to match up the controllers timing to make seamless animations between two lights.

btb.tyler09
If you will consider selling a diy set of these boards, I'd buy them today.

At this point, I only have one side made, so not really a possibility. I figured do one side and see it working on the car before tackling the other side. Hopefully there's an easy way to mirror the boards so I don't need to do this whole thing over.

[btb.tyler09]

Work has been eating my soul lately, but I should probably be grateful to have a job in the current state of things. Anyway, slow and steady progress. I got the first board soldered up and tested. Threw it in a housing just to see what it looks like. Next up will be get the other adjacent light soldered up and on another controller, and then try to match up the controllers timing to make seamless animations between two lights.







At this point, I only have one side made, so not really a possibility. I figured do one side and see it working on the car before tackling the other side. Hopefully there's an easy way to mirror the boards so I don't need to do this whole thing over.

It looks great. Are you planning to leave the lower running light and side light alone to run on the OEM board?

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[weagle1856]

Work has been eating my soul lately, but I should probably be grateful to have a job in the current state of things. Anyway, slow and steady progress. I got the first board soldered up and tested. Threw it in a housing just to see what it looks like. Next up will be get the other adjacent light soldered up and on another controller, and then try to match up the controllers timing to make seamless animations between two lights.







At this point, I only have one side made, so not really a possibility. I figured do one side and see it working on the car before tackling the other side. Hopefully there's an easy way to mirror the boards so I don't need to do this whole thing over.

Woah. This is awesome!!!
Keep at it! Slow and steady wins

[2by2handsofblue]

Man I want this

we are the borg! resistance is futile.

[Coderedpl]

I have a feeling you'd have a bunch of interest for these once they're done, and if you figured out how to "mass" produce them, at least to some extent, you'd have a few customers for sure.

[btb.tyler09]

I have a feeling you'd have a bunch of interest for these once they're done, and if you figured out how to "mass" produce them, at least to some extent, you'd have a few customers for sure.

There are some mass produced ones on AliExpress. Should technically work if you wire them up and code the controller right. Just haven't felt confident enough to drop the money on them to try. Also these are euro style with separated amber turn signal LEDs.

https://www.audizine.com/forum/showt...upgrade-option

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[Fenixx]

You’ll have more than a few if you can find a way to keep prices in check. This is really impressive!

[2by2handsofblue]

Any updates

we are the borg! resistance is futile.

[fmzip]

This is pretty epic! Designing a PCB from scratch with some reverse engineering, impressive!

Might need to try these dynamic ones for $700 :

https://www.aliexpress.com/item/3302...archweb201603_

[2by2handsofblue]

This is pretty epic! Designing a PCB from scratch with some reverse engineering, impressive!

Might need to try these dynamic ones for $700 :

https://www.aliexpress.com/item/3302...archweb201603_

Is it plug and play? Damn I thought buying from china would be a good deal. But made in china isnt as good of deal these days lol.
Let's hope the quality is there.

This for the b8.5 s5/s4?
I assume so since the s5/s4 and rs5 has the same rear taillight

we are the borg! resistance is futile.

[fmzip]

Is it plug and play? Damn I thought buying from china would be a good deal. But made in china isnt as good of deal these days lol.
Let's hope the quality is there.

This for the b8.5 s5/s4?
I assume so since the s5/s4 and rs5 has the same rear taillight

we are the borg! resistance is futile.

Supposedly "yes" to all your questions. How about I start a go fund me page and I'll be the tester ;)

[B4Audi]

I kick up some money and if it works send it back but if it fails we'll just eat it.

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[fmzip]

I kick up some money and if it works send it back but if it fails we'll just eat it.

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This sounds like a good approach. Lots of members can vouch for me, if there's enough interest lets do it.

I've bought off Ali express several times before. The seller appears to be legit, plenty of sales. I'll kick in $375

[2by2handsofblue]

Supposedly "yes" to all your questions. How about I start a go fund me page and I'll be the tester ;)

Lol. But that's for a a4. Is the taillights different style with s5/s4?

we are the borg! resistance is futile.

[Ashtonts]

Lol. But that's for a a4. Is the taillights different style with s5/s4?

we are the borg! resistance is futile.

A4 and S4 tails are the same as long as they're the LED ones. A/S/RS5 have a different shape taillight.

[2by2handsofblue]

A4 and S4 tails are the same as long as they're the LED ones. A/S/RS5 have a different shape taillight.

So the same type of lighting if it's the leds. So this wouldnt work on my s5.

we are the borg! resistance is futile.

[fmzip]

A4 and S4 tails are the same as long as they're the LED ones. A/S/RS5 have a different shape taillight.

Don't these two statements contradict one another??

[Ashtonts]

Don't these two statements contradict one another??

First of all, no. The A5 and S5 could very well have different tail lights while the A4 and S4 share the same lights.

That said, I meant that the A/S/RS 5 have a different shape light from the A4/S4


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[fmzip]

First of all, no. The A5 and S5 could very well have different tail lights while the A4 and S4 share the same lights.

That said, I meant that the A/S/RS 5 have a different shape light from the A4/S4


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I am sorry for being dense....I see it now...the 5's have different lights than the 4's

[2by2handsofblue]

So different shape and lights?
Damn I want this mod for the s5. Cant seem to find it on ali express

we are the borg! resistance is futile.

[Kyokio]

So different shape and lights?
Damn I want this mod for the s5. Cant seem to find it on ali express

we are the borg! resistance is futile.

one option for the a/s/rs5 is purchasing a set of euro tails and sending them to https://audi-retrofits.co.uk/. not sure of the price but expect it to be easily over $1k.