Driver's Side Pillar Trim Removal

[islandreamer]

Has anyone tried removing/installing the driver's side pillar trim (right below seatbelt anchor)? I'm need to tuck in a bunch of speaker out/rca patch cables underneath that trim. The door step trim panels were easy to pop out but this one won't budge(argh)

 

[dima_rus]

just pop out the bottom of it and you will be able to get all your wires through. That's exactly what I did

 

[islandreamer]

just pop out the bottom of it and you will be able to get all your wires through. That's exactly what I did

Thanks for the tip. I'll give this a shot again. I was able to pry open the bottom section near the driver's seat but the section towards the 2nd row was a b_ _ _ _.

 

[islandreamer]

just pop out the bottom of it and you will be able to get all your wires through. That's exactly what I did

Done deal. The weather seal had to be pulled off the metal lip since the plastic clip is held by the rubber. Wires are hidden and out of sight!

 

[icspots]

Similar yet different question.

My father just bought a 5 and I'm going to be installing an auto-dim mirror for him. My big question is how to remove the A-pillar trim. On my 3 you have to remove the: driver's step plate, left side kick panel, pull the weather stripping from the door frame. Once that's done you have to pop the tension clips behind the middle and bottom of the pillar loose and then slide the whole thing upwards to release the last clip.

Can anyone let me know if the process is the same on the 5?

 

[nehvada]

adding question:

why do you need to do that for installing the auto-dim mirror? if you only need power you can get it from the interior light.

if you need a wire to the headlight controls it might only be one wire and you can hide it easily in the door seal without the need to remove the cover.

 

[icspots]

adding question:

why do you need to do that for installing the auto-dim mirror? if you only need power you can get it from the interior light.

if you need a wire to the headlight controls it might only be one wire and you can hide it easily in the door seal without the need to remove the cover.

Hmmm, good question. I don't know if there's both a switched and constant source in the map lights. AFAIK in the 3 there's a constant, but not a switched. I wouldn't want to connect both to a constant source as I don't want the mirror drawing power and staying dimmed all night long (could happen depending on the surrounding light).

Nothing needs to be hooked to the light control, the mirror just needs power. If it were on an older model without the ambient temp on the dash display then I would need to run a wire down and through the firewall for the sensor. Thankfully I can avoid that on this car. (unlike my '05 3)

I hesitate to just run a wire through behind the weather stripping as it could conceivably end up in front of the curtain airbag in the event of deployment. On the 3 there's a wiring bundle running behind the air bag which you can run additional wiring through with no chance of it impinging on the SRS.

Finally I'm pretty sure Mazda's own install instructions have the wiring run down the pillar and tap off the wiring bundles behind the driver's side kick panels. At least that's the way it is on the 3..... not sure about the 5. Granted Mazda has some stupid instructions for installing some things, but overall this isn't too horrible.