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CHEROKEE XJ BODY TRIM REMOVAL |
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CHEROKEE XJ BODY TRIM REMOVAL |
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Project 9
Jeep Cherokee XJ Trim
Removal
Completed by Will Morgan
Before we begin, we will start by answering the question that without a doubt will be asked by hundreds of you...The XJ is a 1990 Wagoneer with a Rusty's Off Road 6.5" Long Arm Kit with 33" BFG Mud Terrain KM's.
Ok, not everyone is crazy about the trim on some vehicles, this just happens to be one of them for me. Since some of the original trim was already missing and since I wasn’t that crazy about it to begin with I decided to remove the factory trim from my 1990 XJ. It is a simple job to do and took less than a half hour to complete, after I was done I was surprised at how much of a difference it made...
First I started by bending up on the corners up with a pair of pliers or a screwdriver to bend enough of the end up to get a good grasp on it. Be careful of the paint when doing so, it is easy enough to do without touching the paint and doing any unnecessary damage. If your paint is already shot and you don’t care, then dig right in...
Once the ends are pulled up you can gently pull outward on the trim and it should break the plastic tabs. Now if you want to keep the trim you may just want to pull the end out and then you can just slide the trim off of the plastic retainers that hold it to the body. I knew that I wouldn’t be saving or reusing these so I chose to just remove it the fast and easy way. Once the trim was removed there were still some of the plastic clips remaining in the holes. With a small punch they were pushed through and all that remained was the small rubber sleeves. Those were easily removed with a small pair of needle nose pliers by gently prying them out...
Now that the trim is all removed I will decide whether or not to cover the holes left from the mounting clips. I think at this point I will just leave them open, since this Jeep will be in a climate that doesn’t see too much moisture it won’t be as much of a concern as it would be if the vehicle was going to be in a high moisture area of the country...
..If I was going to cover the holes I would most likely get some wider black or darker blue pinstripe and tape over them. Obviously if your Jeep is a different color then you may want to use pinstripe tape that closer matches the color of your Jeep. Since this is not going to be a Jeep that goes to car shows this will be a suitable method to cover the holes.
Please forward any questions to...
