2007 Toyota Tacoma - Grilles For 3 Bills - Tech

The Grillcraft kit doesn't contain any pieces to cover the Tacoma's "nostrils", but if you look closely you'll see that the factory texture is a triangular mesh, just like the new Grillcraft pieces.

To remove the plastic rivets, we popped the center up and pulled the whole piece out.

Once off of the truck, we wrapped the chrome portions of the grille shell in masking tape to protect the finish.

We removed the front license plate, and then worked on removing the clips holding the bumper cover in place.

We started with a Roto-Zip and cut the center section out. A jigsaw would have worked well for this as well, but we used what we had.

The two horizontal bars and ten vertical supports were finished off with a reciprocating saw and sanded flush with a rotary tool and sanding drum.

In this photo you can see both where we sanded the grille shell to be flush, and how we had to use an open-ended wrench on the tight confines of the lower grille. The upper grille was easier, as there was more room to maneuver the screws and flat nuts.

We held the grille in position and used a 90-degree pick to mark the locations to drill our 3/16-inch holes. The pick really helped out on the lower grille, because space was tight.

All bolted and clipped back on, the new grilles match the truck and keep the leading edge uncluttered.