FIXED: Aftermarket LED tail light is out or flickers intermittently

I just repaired mine with the help of this thread, it was pretty simple. My left brake light wasn't working (but only when my headlights or parking lights were off) and both left and right blinkers weren't working. I've got everything working now, and took me about an hour. Here's a simple DIY:

1. Remove the black box from your tail lights. It's connected by two connectors; one to the tail lights and one to the resistor.


2. Get the circuit board out of the black box. It is basically a container that they set the circuit board into and then fill up with epoxy, so it isn't easily removable. I had to use a hammer and wood chisel to basically destroy mine to get inside. It may not look like it, but I tried to do as little damage as possible so that I could maybe tape the box back together when I was done.


3. Take a soldering iron and heat up and re-solder the pins. I re-soldered any that didn't look perfect; there were a couple that had a dark ring around the connection. I did NOT solder any together, I just fixed the connections that were already there. I think I re-soldered about three connections on each tail light. The small pins looked fine, I just focused on the large solder joints. I didn't use any new solder, and I didn't suck any old stuff up with de-soldering braid. I just heated and re-melted what was there already.


4. Plug the circuit board back in and test everything. Once you get it all working, wrap up the board in electrical tape. I put some of the remains of the black plastic box back on for protection, and then taped it all up. Who knows how long this fix will last, but it's working perfectly right now. Fortunately it will be easy to re-solder if I have to do it again.

Good work.
I don't think its the components that are substandard, its the solder joints that come undone.
As long as you keep those joints refreshed, you should be fine.
Mine is still working after this fix, almost after 5-6 months I guess.

hey just another confirmation as "mekaneck" did above ... i re-soldered all the soldered points and now it works like brand new! No more getting pulled over for me! Just go to radioshack if you don't have an soldering iron they are $9.00 get the 15amp one so you don't cook the board... i also beefed up the soldering points a little with radioshack's 62/36/3 .022" diameter solder for added security; it seems as though the little Asian kid in China didn't use enough solder the first time thanks guys for all your help on here! i spent a few hours yesterday trying to get a hold of someone to buy a new resistor/cap box... no need now

Originally Posted by bparka12

hey just another confirmation as "mekaneck" did above ... i re-soldered all the soldered points and now it works like brand new! No more getting pulled over for me! Just go to radioshack if you don't have an soldering iron they are $9.00 get the 15amp one so you don't cook the board... i also beefed up the soldering points a little with radioshack's 62/36/3 .022" diameter solder for added security; it seems as though the little Asian kid in China didn't use enough solder the first time thanks guys for all your help on here! i spent a few hours yesterday trying to get a hold of someone to buy a new resistor/cap box... no need now

Glad this thread is helping many people.

excellent that you guys figured out a possible solution, I've followed the DIY and simply heated up the larger solder points, some of them looked like they had black hairline fracture lines in them. Havent had a chance to put it back in yet but will report back on whether successful or not.

The trickiest part is prying open the box. I used soldering pen with a knife attachment, a screw driver and a pick tool. Also dont bother trying to cut into the epoxy resin with the solder, its rock solid.

I thought i would take some more pics for ppl thinking of attempting this, to make it clearer how to open the box. Hope this also helps:

So happy I found this thread, my passenger side blinker is on the fritz. I'm going to take apart that box, and check out and re-solder anything that looks bad. Subscribed.

I just used this thread to fix my passenger tail that would work here and there. So the culprit was the stupid little black box as usual. A few tips that I would like to share.

-You dont need to completely ruin the box when trying to open it. I just took a utility knife and cut down one corner of it, then stretched it open and pulled out the board. It even snapped back into place when i was done and there was no need for tape. I put it on anyway though LOL.

-have it plugged in while the box is open and touch around until your tail lamp turns on. easiest way to diagnose

-My area that needed re soldering was those two pins that the guy earlier in the thread soldered together. I didnt solder them together just because that doesn't make sense to me. I just blobbed a bit of solder on each to secure the connection, making sure that they dont touch each other.

VIOLA! My tail lights are perfect again! Thank you fanatics, you just saved me $200. This site has been SOOOO good to me over the years of owning this car.

I found out my taillight was acting up and it's a good thing I searched! Picked up a soldering iron, checked for the faulty points on the board and soldered it.

Lets see how far this takes me but for now, thanks for this thread.

Wow, got the same problem, glad I came across this thread, I've been pinching the box together for it too work for weeks.

I just had to fix my lights again, my original fix didn't last even 6 months. This time instead of using a soldering iron to heat up the solder joints, I just used a heat gun aimed at the board, and "refreshed" all the solder connections at once. This was way faster (took about a minute) and has fixed everything that was not working. I'll see how long the fix lasts this time, but so far I think this is a much better method than reheating with a soldering iron.

I finally got around to trying this, I just wanted to say again how happy I am I found this thread, it worked, at least so far! I had an intermittent ride side blinker, and I found that the solder joints in the top right, there's three in a row, seem to control the blinker. While I had the blinker going and it wasn't working well, I was able to touch it with the metal part of my key and it would start working, then stop when I came off it. I re-soldered them, and added just a tinyyyyy little bit to them and wa la!

Top three in red in this pic (i borrowed another pic in this thread to highlight the spots I'm talking about)