Correct painting of '80 Capri RS Turbo tail light lenses

[SVOHNO]

As I got my Capri, the paint on the lenses was near gone. I've gone through with OOOO steel wool and polish and they really look new. My question now is what's the correct paint scheme on them. They look like the outer "ribs" were painted, but I can't tell how far in the paint should go. If it's supposed to just be on the outside surface of the rib, I may just use a wide pinstriping, but I don't think that's right.

Any help?

[82CapriRS]

My 82 RS tail lights are stiil unmolested, and only the outer edge of the rib has black paint on it.

What type of polish did you use? I am planning on refinishing mine, also.

Thanks.
Jim P

[gsxdave]

I'm surprised more people haven't answered this thread...when I redid my 79, I masked off the 'red' tailight portion and painted the 'ribs' up to that. (This would be on the horizontal top and bottom surfaces, and obviously, the flat rib portion) But most of the tailights I see in wrecking yards have a rather shoddy finish up to the vertical tailight area, ie; the paint, or mask line isn't a clean edge at all. 'Tho some of this might be due to weathering over the years, I suspect that the factory used a thin foam-type mask that was pressed up against the tailight portion allowing painting of both sides of the raised ribs. This would account for the lack of a clean paint line. Funny, when these cars were new, I never thought to look!