Tools:
• 10mm socket
• Phillips head screwdriver
• Flat head screwdriver
• Narrow trim tool
• Box cutter
• Razor blades
• Sharpie
• Straight edge
Carpet removal:
• Use your trim tool to remove the fastener covers from the door edge trim piece, the trim pieces around the third row bars on the floor, and from the four anchor points.
• Use you 10mm socket to remove trim screws at the third row bars and the four anchor points.
• Remove third row trim pieces and anchor points.
• Use your Phillips head to remove the screws from the door edge trim piece.
• Use your trim tool to gently pry up door trim piece.
• The floor carpet is Velcro’d on the edge near the second row, pull it up.
• Gently pull the edge of the carpet out from under the fender well trim pieces (from front to back), and taking special care near the door as the carpet is pinched by the trim pieces here.
Cutting the mat:
• Assemble the fatigue mat, and remove the trim edges from the edges. (Removing the trim from only three sides is also an option, further explained in step 5 of this section.)
• Place the mat finish-side down on a large flat surface (I used my garage floor).
• The widest portions of the carpet near the doors, let’s call these the “ears”, will over hang the mat. We will compensate for these pieces later.
• Place the carpet finish side down and centered on the mat (it’s important to be exactly center or you run the chance of not having enough material for the “ears” of the mat).
• You may choose to use the trim piece as your back FWD finished edge (nearest the front of the vehicle) or you may want to have the cut edge depending on how confident you are that you can achieve a straight cut. I opted to use the cut edge as it eliminated a seam.
• When tracing the carpet make sure to keep the sharpie perpendicular to the surface of the material. This will help so that when you are cutting the material you can cut towards the inside of the line and end up with a correctly sized piece. If your cuts are too far off and the mat ends up wider than the original carpet it will pucker badly, if it’s too small then it will pull out from under your trim when you try to place heave objects on it.
• Line-up the FWD edge of the carpet to your finished mat edge.
• Trace out the carpet onto the mat.
• The excess material that you have (whether the FWD or rear-most edge of the piece) cut it off and attach it to where the ears overhang the mat on each side.
• Finish tracing out the ears onto the mat.
• Trace out the holes for the third row trim pieces and the four anchor points.
• You will need to remove half the thickness of the mat on the rear edge of the mat, this includes the tabs that secure the mat and an additional inch beyond that. Whether you want to do this before or after you have don all the other cutting is up to you. I did this with a razor blade/blades and took my time. I started by setting my blade to roughly half the thickness of the mat and cutting to this depth, one inch from the edge of the mat. Carefully cut away the thickness with a razor. The best way to describe this is like butterflying a piece of meat. The mat dulls the razor surprisingly quick so have lots of these on hand, I used 4 or 5.
• Cut out your mat, compensating for your traced line.
• I made the large round holes in the tabs using a piece of tubing that I happened to have. I imagine a piece of conduit or coper tubing of the appropriate size would do just fine. The material responds well to shearing so all I did was tape the tube so I didn’t hurt myself and applied pressure with a slight twist once the material was compressed.
• There are four reliefs for the mounting bolts of the third-row attachment bars. I used the sound-deadening to trace these out and take out half the thickness in these areas.
• Using duct tape (I used gorilla brand for its thickness and adhesion) seal all the seams on the bottom side of the mat and add a strip where the mat transitions from its original thickness to the area with the tabs / eyelets. You can use some duct tape on the tabs also if you would like add some strength back to the piece. The tape keeps moisture and dirt from passing through the seams and keeps the individual pieces from separating.
Preparing the sound deadening:
• There are four dense foam pieces where the anchors bolt through carpet. I cut half the thickness out of these with a razor.
• I separated out roughly half the thickness of the factory sound-deadening material. This takes some finesse to do without creating a lumpy / uneven surface.
Installation:
• Combine the mat and the sound-deadening. You can use some spray adhesive if you want, I did not and everything cooperated just fine on installation.
• I chose not to secure the FWD edge with Velcro, but I may add that later if the edge starts to distort.
• Starting from the FWD edge working your back do one side at a time, left or right, and work it under the plastic trim. You’ll need to use the trim tool to help it under the trim near the hatch opening.
• You can slap the mat near difficult areas that try to pucker, this sounds silly, but works really well.
• Re-install trim, and anchor points.
• Stand-back and enjoy the fruits of your labor.
