- How to fully clear out your Japanese OEM clear corners -

This guide applies to the Japanese OEM clear corners and NOT US stock lenses.
You must first get the Japanese lenses to achieve this look.

There's really not much to this so we'll get right into this. There are probably alot of ways to clear your lenses, but these are the methods I came up with and they worked pretty good. Take your time, and you'll do fine.

A list of things you'll need for my methods are:

1) Sheet metal cutter AKA tin snips (makes cutting the pieces a snap)
2) Soldering iron (optional... makes for cleaner work if done right)
3) Needle nose pliers

I cleared mine out two different ways (one way each lense) to see what was better. While each way does the job, I believe the second way will produce a cleaner lense since the more you move the amber lense inside, the more of a chance you have of scratching the clear housing. The scratches aren't major and are actually very small, but who likes scratches?

Here's the lense before clearing. Say bye bye to the yellow blotch.

Method A.

1) Alright, for method A, the first thing you want to do is dislodge the amber piece. Do this by simply putting some tool into the housing and tapping down on it until the amber lense is free. It takes very little force to do this. Next you'll want to remove the small metal piece which helps deflect light away that surrounds the bulb. The piece in question is shown below (with a little blue arrow pointing to the piece). To get it out, use the needle nose pliers and grab it, then twist it around (may wrap around the pliers... this is what you want) then pull it out. Should come out fairly simple. With that out, it's on to the amber lense.

2) Using the sheet metal cutters and needle nose pliers, cut away at the lense continuously until it breaks into pieces you can get out of the socket. This will take some time. I got a bit impatient and started thrashing the lense and twisting with the needle nose pliers. Not only did it not produce quicker results, it put a few scratches (light ones, but I can see them) on the plastic clear housing. So work at it longer with the sheet metal cutters to keep scratching to the minimum. Once done, you'll end up with a pile of shredded amber crap (take pieces out as soon as they'll fit to also minimize scratching).

It took me about 20 minutes with this method for one lense.

**Look at the bottom of this page for a bit of 'cleanup' to consider doing after you're done.

Method B.

For Method B, DO NOT DISLODGE THE AMBER LENSE OR ATTEMPT TO TAKE OUT THE METAL PIECE!!! Using a soldering iron (a wood burning soldering iron may work better due to the wedged tip, but a normal thin one should work... I used one from my tiny little 'computer repair kit' that has finally come in handy :). You are going to use the soldering iron to do the pre cutting (because the tin snips can't go that far into the lense) and you'll need the lense raised above the clear outer shell so you don't hit it when poking through the amber lense. This way will require MUCH more patience and you'll always need to be careful NOT to let the shaft of the soldering iron touch the rim of the light socket. It could melt it making the bulb socket hard or maybe even impossible to twist back on. If you do touch the socket rim, immediately try and push the plastic back into form while it's soft. I suggest ALWAYS keeping the soldering iron shaft away from the three small nicks that the bulb socket drop into. These you absolutely don't want to mess up. Ok, with that disclaimer out of the way, it's time to get soldering that plastic.

1) I should of taken a pic, but I was working that lense silly and forgot so here's a mock drawing of the cuts I made. I started with a pilot hole right in the center and pushed the soldering iron slowly north, south, east and west (blue lines in graphic). Don't try and completely melt up to the edge. You can't maneuver the iron at a good enough angle without hitting the socket rim. With the NSEWest cuts made, cut diagonal between them (red lines in graphic).

2) Ok, with the cuts made (feel free to make more... it will only make this step easier; the cuts I mentioned are what I did) use your sheet metal cutter (or equivalent) and cut the gaps between the soldering lines and the lense edge (yellow lines in graphic). This will take some maneuvering of the lense with the needle nose pliers, but it's alot better than thrashing the pliers around trying to break pieces off plus you avoid scratching the clear outer housing. You may need to make a few random cuts with the tin snips to complete the job. The goal here is to cut it up into as many pieces as possible for extraction without resorting to the twist and pull of method A. You may need to twist a few pieces off with the pliers so do it gently.

It took me 30 minutes for one lense with this method.

Here's the final product.

That's it. I put a little water in the sockets and swished it around to get any tiny tiny plastic pieces out and nab any plastic dust. Rather than pouring the water out, I used a paper towel to soak it up. Didn't know if that metal would rust (looks like some sort of cheap metal so I figured it might).

I'm sure you all realize that's it's probably illegal not to have an amber turn signal right? Good. You also realize that you do this at your own risk. If you mess up your lenses, it's your fault. It doesn't take a genius to do this (I did it :) but nothing will save you if you don't have any common sense.

If you need any more help or don't understand something, feel free to email me at hydelaar@cox.net