How To Remove Door Panel Chevy Tahoe 1995-98

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Hi, I'm Mike Green. I'm one of the owners of 1A Auto. I want to help you save time and money repairing and maintaining your vehicle. I'm going to use my 20+ years' experience restoring and repairing cars and trucks like this to show you the correct way to install parts from 1AAuto.com. The right parts installed correctly, that's going to save you time and money. Thank you and enjoy the video.

In this video we'll be showing you how to remove and then install the door panel on this 1996 Chevy Tahoe, pretty much the same as any '88 to '98 truck and '98 to '99 SUV. You need to remove the door panel for replacing your window regulator, mirror, door handle - a lot of different things. Tools you'll need, as you can see, are pretty basic: a 7mm socket and ratchet or a Phillips screwdriver, a flat blade screwdriver, and a putty knife or a door panel clip tool.

First you start by removing the little panel up near the mirror on the door panel. You can just use your fingers and pull that out. Next, you remove the two bolts in the arm rest. In this truck they're 7mm bolts, but we have seen them be Phillips screwdriver, so it just depends on your truck. You may have 7mm bolts or Phillips screws.

I'm going to use a rag and a screwdriver. The rag is to protect the plastic and vinyl and stuff. Just work it in there gently, high up on the back, and then just shake it and pull it up and the switch plate comes out. Disconnect the speaker by pressing on that and forcing it apart. This connector, you're going to have to press on that and then pull it here. You have to press in there and pull. This connector here, you're going to have to work your screwdriver in there and pull; and then this one here, this last one, you're going to have to work your screwdriver in. Let me get some light there. There's a little tab. You want to get your screwdriver right in there and pull that tab back, and then pull it apart.

Now I'm going to just speed through this. This is seven times speed, so you can see with some of these I struggle a little bit. It is just a matter of getting the screwdriver in there, getting the tab bent, and then pulling them. The plastic does kind of stick together after being together for a long time, but once you get them apart you give yourself a little pat on the back.

Now you want to take your screwdriver, and right in here, push it up and in; and down here; and then down here. Pull that off. Now you're going to take a putty knife and rag and you're going to work it in the door; and then you're going to slide it down and you're going to hit something. That's a clip. You just basically want to take it, pull it so you here it pop, put it in down further, then work your way around it. I'll show you all the clips here.

Once you've released all the clips, the panel lifts up and off. Here's what the back of the panel looks like. Here's where all the clips are, this being towards the front of the car. There's the speaker. You've got three clips up here; one, two, three, four on the bottom; and then one, two on the back side here. One of my clips just came off. What you're doing is you're working the knife right in next to it and then pulling, so that you're pulling on this, not possibly breaking your door panel.

I'm going to plug in this courtesy light first and then I'm going to lift it up; then on top of the door still, press it down. Pull all these up through, this little tweeter speaker wire through. You can see in here there's the pin. You just want to guide them in, way down, guide them in. Same thing on the front here. Extreme close up - you can hopefully see that pin right there. Work it in there and then on down the line. I'm always going to make sure the next pin's ready to go in. Bottom pins are all lined up; that goes right on. Plug in the tweeter and then all the plugs for this. We're going to do one final test of everything. Yup, that's working. Mirrors are working; windows, locks, okay. Now we're going to put this down and in, and then we'll put our two bolts in.
So we've gotten our bolts in here and everything's good. All of our things are working; got your door handle up. One last piece of the puzzle.

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