How to remove undercarriage "screw" 2011 Gen 3

The center part pulls out. Use a flat blade screw driver. I may brake, most of them do sooner or later.

 

I'm usually pretty "up" on checking those underpanels, remove a lot of them, just to see how it's done, and/or to check for mud/dirt accumulation. But that side piece stymied me. I see on ours one or two of the "fasteners" have actually rattled loose and departed. There's several different styles of fasteners too? A real committee design for sure. Good luck, hope you get it figured out.

Attached is a relevant Repair Manual excerpt, not sure how helpful.

 

Dirt falls into the backside of these and they jam up. It makes it inevitable that you’ll break a couple. You can get cheap generic replacements from most local autoparts stores. They may not have the same style heads but virtually all 8mm pop fasteners will work for you.

 

Whenever you have plastic fasteners out, wash them in a pail/bowl of hot soapy water, and work the mechanism a bit too. It helps some.

For prying plastic fasteners out, I find a paint can opener like this:



to be most useful. I'll sometimes also use a small flat blade screwdriver, alone or in concert with the above. If the fastener head is up but the dang thing still won't come out, one of these:


the conventional automotive fastener pry tool, can sometimes help: wedge it under the fastener collar and gently lever up.

 

I find that a pocket screw drive works best to remove the compression tab from these types of fasteners.

 

If the heads are not already stripped, push the tip of a blade screwdriver on the outer ring or "washer" of the fastener to hold it in place. The center should screw out in the anti-clockwise direction. Not holding the "washer" will cause the entire fastener assembly to spin and stay in place.

If the center is stripped, you can drill them out with a 1/4 inch drill bit and pry off the remaining "washer" part with a screw driver.

Toyota uses 7mm Nylon 6-6 push rivets. More common 8mm ones used on many other import cars will not work, so make sure you get genuine Toyota 7mm ones or their generic equivalents.

 

Thanks! apparently I’m buying 7mm fasteners out of an 8mm bin.

 

That's one thing to be cautious of: bin-stored fasteners in hardware stores get badly mixed. To be fair: it's easy to do, lol.

 

More along the lines of this:

 

No, those are different than the ones kindly described in earlier postings. Here’s a page in Japanese with a good photo showing how those clips work and advice on removing them. If you try to loosen one with a screwdriver, the natural tendency to push in on the fastener will just press it back onto the bolt. Instead, turn the fastener gently while pulling the cover away from the car.

If you break one, though, it can be replaced: parts catalog Figure 51-02, Suspension Crossmember & Under Cover, says the list price for a clip, part number 90467-17025-C0, is $2.61.

 

I was thinking of the rocker panel, thanks for clearing it up.