Body/Trim: B-Pillar Removal

[Moose Test]

Does anyone have any practical experience with, and thus any tips on, removing the b-pillar upper panel? That's the cloth covered one, through which the passenger seat belt passes.

VIDA seems to suggest that it is partly held by clips underneath the door trim, and that it is comes out separately from the lower, black plastic part which houses the air duct. But the only YouTube video I can find on the subject makes it look like butchery of the interior. And the D- and C- pillars are hardly fun, until you know exactly where the various clips are located

Overall I'm looking, foolishly or not, to remove the headlining.

TIA

[aslan]

I removed my both my B-pillars to replace the cloth.

Removal of the headliner was not necessary. I followed the instructions in VIDA. I wouldn't say it was very easy TBH. I recall the main problem was how the lower part of the B-pillar is interlocked with the front and rear bottom trims, the front kick trims really need to be taken off to make things easy. The rear ones I got away with loosening half of it.

[Tony500]

Originally Posted by aslan

I removed my both my B-pillars to replace the cloth.

Removal of the headliner was not necessary. I followed the instructions in VIDA. I wouldn't say it was very easy TBH. I recall the main problem was how the lower part of the B-pillar is interlocked with the front and rear bottom trims, the front kick trims really need to be taken off to make things easy. The rear ones I got away with loosening half of it.

Sorry but how do you replace the cloth? I need to do this.



I removed the bottom trims and just tugged from the bottom up.... you do need to remove the door seals due to a metal clip being seated under them.


Refitting is an absolute headache.... I dyed mine and almost got dye on my headline

[aslan]

I sent mine off to an upholstery shop to recloth it.

[Moose Test]

Thanks to everyone who offered advice. I removed the panels last weekend and it was a pig of a job, much more time consuming than the removal of any other piece of internal trim, even when you get the hang of it.

I'd suggest to anyone looking to do the same that it would be much easier and faster as a two person task, with one person pulling the bottom (black section) of the panel outwards (into the vehicle) and downwards (and further onto the bottom air duct), with another exerting outward (again, into the vehicle) pressure on the back of the upper plastic tongue/clip (which inserts into a hole in the chassis at the top of the b-pillar) with a large flat bladed screwdriver, whilst also pulling downward. I think it's pretty essential to have removed the lower door/kick trim, front and rear, first.

Absolute pain. And you wouldn't believe the amount of dust, hair and general unpleasantness that seems to collect behind (especially around the seat belt mounting).

On the plus side, changing the headlining wasn't anywhere near so difficult (or disaster prone) as I'd feared. I've managed to take the dark coloured, pristine condition trim from one of my cars and install it in another, without inflicting any obvious damage or marks. V. Chuffed.