Postby G35TR » Sun Nov 09, 2008 6:05 am
It wasn't too difficult, but turned out to be a little more then I thought before I started.
I didn't realize that the grill itself is the entire black plastic portion which contains the honeycomb meshing that I eliminated, as well as all the grill connection points. The chrome portion is nothing but trim, and ONLY connects to the plastic backing.
My intentions originally were to simply remove the black part, and replace it, but soon realized that this was going to be impossible since there was no way to connect the chrome trim back to the truck. Because of this, the honeycomb mesh has to be cut out of the black portion of the grill, so the black grill backing could be retained and kept in place. Here are the high level steps involved. If there is some real interest froma number of people, i may consider taking it back apart (since I am pretty familiar with it now), and do an actual detailed write-up with photos.
1. Remove entire grill assembly from the front of the vehicle. If I remember correctly, this can be done by:
A. Removing the 4 clips up top by the radiator
B. Releasing the 4 large push thumb tabs behind the grill just above the bumper.
C. Release the 4 square twist bolts (plastic) by twisting counter clock-wise using a flat head screwdriver. You can see these clearly by looking directly into the honeycomb grill towards the radiator, right along the far right and left sides. These were not used again as I had to cut away this portion of the honeycomb, plus since they are soft plastic, they seemed to strip away very easily.
2. Separate the grill backing from the chrome grill trim. This can be a PITA! There are 6 screws which are easy to remove, then a bunch of tough thumb tabs. Most the tabs I just broke off as they seemed a bit overkill. Plus I didn't care to deal with these damn things ever again.
3. Now you will need to cut/saw the black honeycomb out of the grill backing. I cut right along the edges of all three inlets, and removed everything.
4. Cut whatever material you want to use as your new filler, into the exact shape of the 3 inlets, just larger then the inlets themselves. You will need to make notches here and there for clearence for the grill trim guides. Be sure not to block the holes for the 6 screws either. Also, you will need to bend your new shapes with a slight curve in order to match the curved contour of the grill.
5. Once the 3 new pieces are cut to shape and prepped (cleaned and painted), gently put them in place on top of the grill backing, and lay the chrome grill trim down on top. You should now be able to squeeze the entire grill assembly (backing and trim) back together, sandwiching your new material firmly in place. Assuming your fitment is good, you shouldn't have any problems with the pieces moving around. Reattach the 6 screws holding the grill trim onto the grill backing.
6. Reattached entire grill assembly back onto the truck.
7. Add emblem. If you wanted to use the OEM Nissan emblem, you could break/cut off the 4 push tabs, and glue this to the center of the grill, but I opted to buy the smaller emblem with the double sided tape, and just stuck it on.
Last edited by
G35TR on Sun Nov 09, 2008 6:11 am, edited 1 time in total.