Rear brake light high middle cover removal

[Cheezsoup]

Running some wires for a rear dash cam, removed the rear middle light (brake) cover, unfortunately the expanding pins (called ?) got broken off . 

My son is popping out to a Toyota main dealer tommorow to get a new plastic piece.

However what I am wondering is if I ever need to get this cover off again how do I do it without breaking these pins.

[flash22]

Pop the round covers off and remove the screws, don't forget Monday and Tuesday are days in lieu so not everywhere is open

the cover is about £40 if they have any in stock

81977-K0030

[Cheezsoup]

Thanks for that Flash (Bob?), however the bit I was meaning was once I had taken the covers off and the screws out.

The pins that the screws expand into the framework of the car held the cover on and in trying to muscle off the cover

(once the screws where out) the pins got broken.

 

[venomx]

With Flashes advice I managed to get the damaged rear brake light clip back into place without having to spend an extortionate £40.

Basically I snapped the tabs off, and then got some expanding washers off eBay for about £5 and it does the job

 

I bought one set of these...

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/391433775994

and one set of these...

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/323087843646

[flash22]

Not sure on that one, another member asked the same thing but on a MK2 yaris end up cutting the clips off and using screw plugs aka locknut instead with a screw and washer

 

 

 

[Cheezsoup]

Thanks all.

Son is a mechanic (it was him that broke the cover)

I dremeled (other rotary tools are available) off the remaining bit of the clips from the cover.

He had some expanding nuts (from a landrover defender) These were ground down to ≈ 9mm (2 mins work), as they were a bit big to fit in the holes in the cars body work .

As the original screws were a tad too big (ᴓ) slightly smaller screws (with washers) were used to hold the cover in place.

Saves getting a whole new cover from Toyota (£50 for a bit of plastic .  Extorsionate! )

[flash22]

Good to hear this fix helped another member - trying to solve a common issue

[Campblor]

I moved my camera as though the dealer followed the instructions putting the camera in the centre it's right in my field of view! So I moved it to the left of the brake light, still captures the rear view fine. 

I noticed a clip was broken and was replaced with another push in screw part. Thankfully didn't make it worse.