Custom DOT approved taillights?

[slipnfall]

Hi there, I sprung a wild hair last night and am thinking about taking on a little custom light work for my 240. I hope you'll meet this with a bit of open-mindedness. ;-) I'm currently working towards an EE degree so this would be up my alley for a good project.

I'm considering fabricating a programmable tail-light assembly for a 92 240sx. I have some hook-ups in the plastics industry, and I think I could make this fly. Basically it'd comprise of the stock lense assemblies filled with an LED cluster(read:completely filled, all the way around). Of course all these LED's would need a microprocessor to controll them easily. The beauty in this all is that it can be customized, or reprogrammed on the fly. Say you want oem signals by day, Skyline style tonight! Animated tail-lights brings some cool ideas to mind!

All this asside, what are your thoughts on legality? Obviously anything non-DOT approved is risky-business, but what would one have to do to have them conform to DOT approval? I would assume that unless I'm big Acme Corp, getting actual approval is asking too much... Anyone have DOT spec's as far as brightness(lumineres(sp)), size, etc, etc? I feel that unless I can find some extremely bright white LED's, lamps would be best for reverse.

Thanks much,-Jamie

[[Zero-S]]

Its already been done (read:clearcorners.com)And they look damn good...even though they charge out the azz for it. I'm getting a set soon:) (for my S13)

Oh nevermind...you said animated. Well I suggest you look at that site I showed you. Remember, these lights need to be sealed if you want people to use them daily, because electronics+humidity=bad...

[nametakennow]

That'd be cool, though the only way to tell if the brightness is right would be to test them against other tails you have (friend's cars, your old ones), or some sort of measuring do-hicky. good luck