How to Replace Tailgate Handle 2005-15 Toyota Tacoma

Let's get started on our tailgate handle here. Open up your tailgate, you're gonna remove all these T30 bolts, they go all the way around. Let's get them all off of here. Let's grab onto this plastic, see if we can move it around a little bit. Slide it out of here. Now that we have this opened up, let's take a nice look to make sure we're dealing with the right part. We have this area right here, which is right where our camera is gonna mount in. I'm not necessarily worried about disconnecting the electrical connector because it's just gonna go right on to here, and that's where the camera lens will be. If you look up along here, you're gonna see you have the area for both those arms, it's very important to make sure they match up. This looks great. Let's continue with the install.

The first thing we're gonna do is get the arms off of here, just a little tab. Generally speaking, you can push it and it should come off of that. It should come unlocked. I'm not necessarily worried about the lock because my new one comes with it. So, that's good. Go ahead and get this one off of there as well. That's the way it should look. Grab those arms, take them right off. The next thing we're gonna do is remove these two bolts right here and move the camera to the side. But of course, be very careful because you don't wanna scratch that lens. I'm gonna grab a cloth. Ten-millimeter. Draw this up and out of here. Here's our lens. Make sure it's not cracked or scratched. Set that out of your way. Now, we're gonna continue on to these 10-millimeter headed bolts. Get this one outta here. This is our last bolt, so I'm gonna hold on to that. Get this out of here. There it is. All right. Here we go. Let's get this in. Come from underneath just like this. We're gonna roll it up and in. Perfect. Go ahead and grab your mounting bolts, we're gonna mount this in. I'm just gonna snug these up. Gonna grab a ratchet, just check them real quick.

Once these are bottomed out, just give them a teeny bit more. This looks great. Let's get the camera on there. Just carefully line it up. Okay. Let's do these rods now. Go ahead and slide it right into the hole. Should fit fine. And then just put over the lock. It's this little clip right here. If you can't get it over with your fingers, just use some pliers, fairly simple. Slide it right over, grab that lock. Make sure you lock it in. Make sure you don't have any extra parts. There's no tools or anything inside here because now we're gonna be putting the panel back on.

All right. So, let's get this back in. Just one thing to pay attention to is this tab right next to my fingers. As we bring it in, you wanna make sure you line that tab up. Lift up on this. Start sliding it in and under. Put tab in there. Should sit flush. All your bolt holes should be lining up. This looks great. Now, it's time to get the bolts back in. We want to remember that you wanna use the larger bolts up towards the front, then the smaller bolts coming along the sides. Now that we have them all started in, let's go ahead and snug them up. That looks great. See you later.