DIY: Swapping the 997.1TT taillights to the newer 997.2TT LED taillights

For quite some time, I have admired the newer LED taillights now offered on 2010 Turbos and was hoping to be able to make the conversion on mine. I wanted to wait until someone has already made the swap on their 2007-2009 Turbos successfully. When erazer72 (Ethan) posted that his team was able to do it successfully on a 2009 Turbo, I decided to move forward with the project. Ethan and I corresponded a few times about getting the parts needed. I had the guys at Motoring Unlimited in Issaquah, WA do the job for me. They were very thorough and persistent in getting everything installed correctly and working properly. I'd highly recommend using those guys if you're up here in the Northwest. The guys working there are Porsche technicians. Following Ethan's post here (LED swap by Ethan), we thought the swap would be relatively straightforward. As we did the installation, we found out that there were quite a few more hurdles to the swap than we originally thought. I'll elaborate a bit further as I explain the steps involved in making the switchover.

The parts needed are:
Exhaust surrounds (left & right, 997-505-651-02-01C and 997-505-652-02-01C)
LED taillights (left & right, 997-631-413-02 and 997-631-414-03)

There are actually two bumpers, one with the parking sensor holes and one without:

Mine has the parking sensors so I got this one:
997-505-941-10 (For some reason this one costs about $100 dollars more)
Without parking sensor holes
997-0505-941-09

Bumper support bracket (997-505-641-03)
Front & rear control units (I'll explain this later too)
Front (997-618-513-01)
Rear (997-618-260-08)

Taillights and exhaust surrounds




Comparing the old vs new taillights




Taillights (left & right, 997-631-413-02 and 997-631-414-03)


Compare the old taillights with the new. There's no exposed wiring on the new one


New bumper has a different cutout for the new taillights


Bumper support bracket since two of the screwholes are in different places on the new bumper compared to the older bumper


The support bracket comes in black but you really won't be able to tell since it's mostly covered by the bumper


Some of the parts ready to go


New bumper all ready to go


Getting my Turbo ready for the installation


They also took the time to check my tires and clean up my suspension components. These guys are very thorough!


I need new tires soon


The insides were VERY dirty. They cleaned that up for me


The last time I'll see this bumper on my car




Removing my old bumper


No bumper




Test fitting the new taillight


Nice to see what's behind the bumper. The intercooler! Cool!




Taking the components off the old bumper

 

New vs old bumper


It was at this point that Jake realized that the sensor bracket on my old bumper was different than the new one




Old sensor bracket


New sensor bracket


It appeared that Porsche changed the sensor to use a longer type and it would not work with my old sensors which was a bit too big for the bracket


We had to decide what to do. Either order new sensors or try to swap the brackets from the old to the new. We decided to swap

the brackets. We took the old brackets off.


Using epoxy resin, we put the brackets on the new bumper


Perfect fit




Removing the bumperettes


Installing the bumperettes on the new bumper


The old tntercooler trim had to be removed too


All the pieces holding the trim piece




The new exhaust surround is quite a bit larger than the old one but it fit perfectly with my TechArt tips


A little bit of plastic tabbing had to be cut from the LED taillights to work with the wiring harness




Removing the lower trim piece




Old bumper


New bumper is almost ready to be put on


Front trunk is where the front control unit is.


We had to remove most of the trim pieces to reach the unit. In Ethan's original posting, he mentions that it was necessary to swap the #14 to 34 and 6 to 21 pins in the black connector of the front control unit. As we discovered when things were put back together, there things weren't working the way they should be. There was no option in the PIWIS to turn the LED mode on. The rear LED taillights were blinking fast, and the left driving lights were not coming on at all. Our guess was that it was because my 2007 Turbo had an older control unit. We then ordered the front control unit from the 2009 Turbo and installed it. At this point, the LED option showed up but things were still not working correctly. We then ordered the rear control unit from the 2009 Turbo too. We also swapped the the pins for the front from #11 to 36 because Ethan says it'd be necessary to do that if the lights were flashing fast. The rears were swapped from #42 to 31. So, if you have a 2007 or even a 2008, it might be necessary to get the newer control units. You'll know for sure by looking at the part numbers on both control units. Once we got both front and rear control units installed, the LED option was showing up in the PIWIS but the lights were still not working correctly. The front turn signals weren't even working at all. We then switched the pins for the front control unit back to the way it was before and but left the rear control units the way they were as specified in Ethan's original posting and everything was finally working correctly!

PIWIS setup

 

Rear control unit is under the driver's seat on my 2007 Turbo. Not sure if it's in a different places in other model years




Working on the connectors




INstalling the parking sensors


Installing the lower trim piece




When we installed the new bumper. We discovered that the exhaust shield opening was too small because of the smaller exhaust surrounds on the old bumper. We had to trim the shielding a bit for the new one to fit in place as a result.


Taking the bumper off again


Reattaching the bumper after trimming the exhaust shield


Missing the taillight


The discarded bumper bracket


Once on, it looked absolutely gorgeous!


This is the way it should have looked all along!




Programming the new control modules to accept the LED taillights is necessary too


Finishing things up


Exhaust tips looks good!


Once we got the wiring and programming all sorted out, everything finally was working!


Brake lights


My car looks really good with the new bumper and taillights!


Home at last


LEDs up close


Turn signals work too


In closing, I'd like to say that I'm very happy with the end results of this whole thing. It took four days to get it done mainly because we kept having to overnight parts from the dealership to make everything work properly. I hope that this has been helpful for you guys and gives those of you on the fence on making the changes, reason to make the jump. In all, this whole thing cost me about $3000 in parts, painting, labor, etc.

I'll do a photoshoot of my car with the new LED taillights soon.

 

Wow! That looks great! I love it! Flawless.

 

came out amazing! Love Cobalt.

 

Great swap! The new taillights look awesome!

 

Looks awesome and great write up!

 

Looks great. But yeeesh. Didn't think it would be that labor intensive!

 

what a pain in the ass, seems like it would have been easier to get a .2

great result though

 

It isn't...not if you know what you're doing. This write-up should go a long ways in helping with the swap. I actually like my 997.1 very much. Don't care much for the newer 3.8 block in the 997.2.