I am trying to pull out my front seat belts to clean them. They look like well.... 11 years of use. I started pulling all the molding to get to the bolts that hold the top anchor in place. In the 2nd row there are (2) Oh S*** handles. The one on each side that is a "d" shape has super soft screws in there and I cannot for the life of me get them out. Everything I have tried to use wants to strip the heads. WTF? Any one pulled them? Anything I should know? What is the trick to getting these out? These have been by far the hardest thing to disassemble on my truck yet..... And I do a lot myself....
Removing front seat belts - real time help
- Thread starter Mxndrnks
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I've never taken those handles out but for tough screws, I use a screwdriver impact set... where you hit the head of the tool with a hammer/mall and it turns the screw as it applies pressure. In any case, it is a good tool to have.
Assuming I read this correctly, why do you need to remove the second row handles? You should just be able to remove the upper bolt and then the one behind the plastic on the bottom IIRC.
Pop the cover off the top.
- Thread starter
- #6
I've never taken those handles out but for tough screws, I use a screwdriver impact set... where you hit the head of the tool with a hammer/mall and it turns the screw as it applies pressure. In any case, it is a good tool to have.
Thanks! I'll look for one of these.
This in theory seams like a straight forward approach to me too! However, when looking at the upper anchor, it is attached to a track that is held in place by (2) bolts and the track and bolts are both behind the plastic panel. And that plastic panel is one piece that continues over the 2nd row door. So, the way I am looking at it both rear handles need to be removed to pull the entire plastic panel and to get to the upper bolt on the track. If any of this makes sense.
At this point it is somewhat academic. I am just going to undo the bottom bolt and pull the seat belt all the way out as far as I can. It is really only the lower part that is used that looks horrible. So I think I can get it pretty clean in place.
But.... I really want to know how to get these screws out. I would like to replace the two on the passenger side that are somewhat mangled from my efforts. I am also guessing I would need to pull these if I ever need to pull the head liner to run wires or anything....
- Thread starter
- #7
OK... Now looking at that, I will look more in my FSM and see how to pop the top cover off. I didnt see how to do it looking at it and didnt want to break anything.
Take a pic of what screw you're working on.
- Thread starter
- #9
Here is the diagram on my truck.
It does look like in this diagram I should be able to take that cover off (circled in red). The two screws that are striping and I would like to replace are also circled in the above image. For some reason these two are made out of a different material then the rest of the "assist grips" and is pretty soft. Not to mention they do not want to come out AT ALL. So, if any one has experience with these two and has any insight I would really appreciate it. There is nothing I have found yet in my FSM about them.
IIRC when I had my headliner out for DVD install those screws stripped on me too. EZ out, and hardware store to fix. I also remember thinking "WTF?"
Typos sent from my HTC EVO using the IH8MUD app...
Typos sent from my HTC EVO using the IH8MUD app...
Resurrecting this thread since this appears to be the best place for this discussion.
How do you remove the wire that connects to the seat belt housing?
I removed the B pillar plastics, unbolted the top latch and bottom bolts holding in the housing, but can't figure out how to remove the wire.
After 14 years, the seat belts are definitely due for a cleaning.
I'll post a pic in a few minutes.
How do you remove the wire that connects to the seat belt housing?
I removed the B pillar plastics, unbolted the top latch and bottom bolts holding in the housing, but can't figure out how to remove the wire.
After 14 years, the seat belts are definitely due for a cleaning.
I'll post a pic in a few minutes.
Here's what I did: to get the lower b pillar cover off you need to unbolt the fixed end of the belt. Pull the belt out as far as you can and alligator clip in in position. Use your steam cleaner wand with some gentle soap and have at it. When done, run the fixed end over and through the opposite side chicken handle to dry. Put a box fan in the vehicle in cooler seasons. You won't get it all the way down to the spool but that part doesn't com out anyway. Make sure to also clean the funk off the shoulder slide so your nice clean belt moves freely.
I don't know how different they are than the 80, but on it I was able to completely remove the belt and throw in in the washer. Toyota also sells a kit that includes Velcro to clean the hoop on the pillar and slippy tape to put there afterwards.
Thorough cleaning and doing the velcro trick didn't do it for my seat belts. In despair I finally, a few months ago, hit the belts with some silicone spray. So far the silicone trick seems to be compensating for Toyota's paltry engineering on my seat belts 
Check with your dealership if you use one. Toyota was able to 'comp' me some new front belts. Awesome to have them work correctly. I have used the dealer for some big jobs so maybe they owed me. I was pleased by the gesture.
You DO NOT need to remove your seatbelts to get them clean as new. I just purchase a 98 100 with 265k miles on it. Tan interior and the tan belts in front were almost black with 15 years of spillage, oil from hands, and other assorted spillage. A quick Google search and I found that detailers extend the belts to their maximum length, pull them outside the doors and close the doors so the belts hang outside the vehicle. Simply saturate with a NON-petroleum based degreaser (I used citrus based), let it soak and hose off with high pressure stream of water. My belts look NEW. Sure, my clothes were soaked, but it was worth it. My wife wouldn't get in LC before, now she want to make it her own. What have I done?