tail light fell out.

i have a 2008 double cab 4x4 and took it on its first adventure. when up and down a round river rock stream (dented my skidplate, oh well). did not do any body damage, just lots of bouncing. i was driving down the logging road after and my passenger tail light fell out. the clips just snapped, no damage, no evidence of being hit.
it was a few degrees below freezing, and quite a bumpy bit of driving but WTF?

has anyone else experienced anything like this?

 

^^^^^^^^^^


someone mustve taken your bolts out or you did and forgot to put them back in

 

A few degrees below zero and if the bolts were over tightened, I would imagine at that temp the plastic became more brittle and with maybe over torqued bolts it went snap, crackle, pop.

 

Or as I did once, I slide over a tree stump and flexed the end of the rear bumper up into the taillight. Popped it right out of there and saw it dangling in my pass. side mirror.
If you push up on the end of the bumper you can flex it up to the taillight with your hands.

 

i had ebay tail lights before and the one clip was already broken "tightend too much" and the other clip snapped while off roading, i lost my light cover+light harness haha i had to buy a new harness and put the stock tails back on

 

^^This

 

i have never taken the lights outs, but the last owner may have. both bolts are still secured into the clips in the truck, they just broke off of the light itself. i doubt i hit the bumper much at all but that is very possible and would make the most sense.

 

upon further inspection i put a small dent in the bumper and it twisted accordingly into the tail light. today i get a better bumper.

 

I trimmed the plastic part on the top of the bumper under the tail light and pulled the bumper ends out about an inch to clear when it twists up.

A new rear bumper with wraparounds would be nice. $ $ $ $