Lx470 lower outer door cladding removal?

[63cruiser]

I had to make my own. Not perfect but they worked along with 3m adhesive tape. Unfortunately, a lot of them are a are a little different so if you don’t have any to reprpduce from, it will be tough

 

[SteveH]

I'm considering making a long strip and notching it to fit the bottom of the door cladding cutouts, rather than making 5-6 individual brackets. I wish I had one to copy, but I'll just wing it. I will use galv. steel or cold-galv so it doesn't rust out again.

 

[SteveH]

Cladding hell update: Removed rocker and pass. front door cladding. Had to remove the running board to remove the rocker cladding. Colo. vehicle, but 23 years old and 309K miles - some rust. All metal hardware (attached to the cladding from the factory) has dissolved. This metal hardware is only attached to the cladding, so you can't order it at your Toyota/Lexus dealer. Must have spent 3 hours removing the clear caulk used by the PO - miserable stuff - only sticks to the vehicle paint.

I had a buddy repaint the cladding and then reinstalled the cladding with new plastic clips (where useful) and PL urethane adhesive, which sticks well to the cladding. I applied the adhesive to the face of the clips, so that it can be disassembled in the future. I also used 3M trim tape (cut in half) on all edges except the bottom (which never had any). PL urethane takes 24-48 hours to really cure. Looks great so far - hope that it all moves as it should on a hot day. I took the time to remove rusty bits and entomb every rusty surface under the cladding in axle grease.

Military tires used as weights to hold cladding firmly against the door until adhesive cure.

 

[packeted]

Thanks for this thread guys! I finally decided to bite the bullet and start taking off the cladding on my 06 LX in Silver as the paint has faded and I'm going to get them professionally refinished. To my surprise, so far things have gone pretty well - wasn't too hard to pry them off. Next up, I need to remove the running boards to remove the trim around the arches and lower sill. Also need to refinish my license plate molding - is that held on from behind? Do I need to remove the carpet trim and access from behind?

Here are some photos of the trim pieces in case it's helpful! Will need lots of replacement double sided tape to reinstall these!

 

[packeted]

Took the rest of the cladding off today and here are a few photos in case they're useful to anyone. No rust on this rig and they all came off relatively easily with some plastic pry tools. Now they're off to the bodyshop to be refinished Took me ages to remove all the double sided foam tape on the edges of the panels with a blade and a bit of goo-gone.. hopefully it will all pay off!

 

[ClassyJalopy]

Do you think it would have been easier/cheaper to just repaint them in place? Like @OwnerCS did on his previous rig?

 

[packeted]

Would definitely have been easier for me! Couldn't find a good body shop that wanted to do it that way.. Hopefully it comes out looking like new!

 

[ClassyJalopy]

Yes - hope it turns out great for you. Very interested in learning how the putting them back on goes. Mine are getting a little tired and would need something like this soon

 

[Rolocado]

Took the rest of the cladding off today and here are a few photos in case they're useful to anyone. No rust on this rig and they all came off relatively easily with some plastic pry tools. Now they're off to the bodyshop to be refinished Took me ages to remove all the double sided foam tape on the edges of the panels with a blade and a bit of goo-gone.. hopefully it will all pay off!

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You ever get this all back together with a photo? How much did it cost you to get everything painted?

 

[packeted]

I did, it wasn't to hard in the end but probably thanks to the lack of rust. I replaced just a few of the clips that had broken, spent a fair amount of time removing any remnants of the old tape and applied a lot of new 3M VHB tape (https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0B4MTX8RQ/?tag=ihco-20). It came out really well, looks like new. My painter did a good job, for the silver trim inserts he just left them in and masked them off - I was a little worried it would look bad but it looks great. He also sprayed the license place backing (that is chrome underneath) and that came out pretty good too. It was about 13 panels in total, the rocker panels are the longest. It cost about $1200 to prep and paint them with me handing them all to him off the car, but I think that was a very good deal. Probably just under a day prepping them and putting them all back on.

 

[packeted]

Some photos of the prepped panels. You can peel just a little away, put the panel in position and clipped in and then remove the tape covering to secure it down, that worked pretty well.