Scotty

iTrader: (13)

The underlying plastic cracks long before the vinyl on top. You may not notice it until it's bad enough to cause tears in the vinyl, but every SC I've ever worked on/pulled parts from has had cracks on the plastic structure of the window trim and map pocket, even super low mileage garaged ones. O.L.T. is exactly correct on this one. That said, the shop should still make it right and make sure the car was in the same condition or better than when it was brought in.

O. L. T.

iTrader: (17)

I can't help it if your car is the more intelligent of the two. It might be holding out for a new owner. The other 89% of the people on the forum are aware I'm right.

Duck05

The craftsman I used worked for Lexus before and he has worked on "hundreds" of these panels when he was there and many since when he went into business specializing in leather and vinyl repair. He also stated that these panels will fail pretty much on their own even after just one year.

Worst design, he said, ever made for a lot of reasons and they crack just due to opening and closing the door.

That said, mine were NOT damaged externally until the un-experienced guy at the body shop basically pulled them off the car so even though the under structure underneath the leather may have been broken the visual damage after removal was quite pronounced. A lot of the anchor points and tabs were damaged pretty bad and since that panel had never been removed before it should not have had as much as what was found.

I will work something out with the body shop owner - he is a bit difficult to tie down but so far he has been a standup guy when faced with facts and I still would recommend his shop to paint your vehicle.

Duck05

We agreed on a fair settlement and he paid me back for most of the repairs. Good guy.