drewkaree

Since I badly wanted to remove the useless phone a dealer installed, I figured I'd document it here for anyone else considering it. I have a 1996 LS400. Since I was a bit impatient and forgot to take pics of stuff as I went along, some pics will seem a bit out of place once you see the end result – I went back and redid a few steps to take pics, and also to show you the better way to do it – I ended up doing 1-2 useless things that wasted a bunch of my time because I wasn't thinking. (In reality, it was because my wife was watching me, and I wasn't going to listen to her advice! LOL)

Here's what the phone in my center armrest console looked like (yours may be different, but the theory is relatively the same):

drewkaree

The first step I wanted to take is to disconnect the phone from the rest of the wiring. I figured if I couldn't figure out how to disconnect the wiring, there was no point in even removing the phone from the console! The wiring for my phone led down into the area by/beside the air duct for the rear passengers, and was actually connected underneath the lower console tray. In case all that didn't make sense, here's a pic of the console tray I'm referring to:

drewkaree

To remove this lower tray, there are 3-5 screws (I'm guessing, it'll depend on your model). Mine only had 3 screws, and 2 friction fittings. Since I'm missing the pic of the other two screws I had to remove, refer to the pic above. At the front of the lower console tray near the latch area, there's a small thumbnail-sized panel that has to be removed. Once that's removed, you can then take out the screws that are behind that panel. Other models apparently had two screws on the BOTTOM of the console tray as well, but mine has the friction fittings. Anyhoo, once you've removed the screws there, you'll have to remove the vent “gate”. In this pic, you can see how that starts to come out, and the little thumbnail-sized panel that hides the other screw you need to remove:

drewkaree

Remove the screw shown in the pic below. In my case, at this point, I experienced the MOST frustration of this entire process. From everything else I had found (including my manual), it showed two screws I'd have to remove from the lower part of the console tray, and there simply was NO WAY there were two more screws. Pulling up was extremely difficult, and I was afraid I was going to crack the tray! Lord only knows how expensive that little tray is!

drewkaree

I ended up sticking an LED light in there while I lifted (I didn't trust the wife for this delicate maneuver since she's worse than I am when it comes to patience) and I was able to see a little clip. I figured out soon enough that it was a friction clip when one of the sides let loose and the clip fell down into the innards. In this pic, here's the location of both of these clips. If you can get a screwdriver in there or some other implement....goodonya. Just be careful. I know I was petrified I was gonna crack the tray, and I can promise you'll probably feel the same way!

drewkaree

Sorry about the quality of a few of these pics. I used my cel phone for a few of these, and wasn't going to go through the hassle of removing everything again for pics with a GOOD camera lol. With the lower console tray removed, you can see the two holes where the friction fittings went into. You can also see that the air vent tubing is hiding the wiring and plugs I needed to get at. The upper section pulls off easily for this task (it actually came off when I removed the grate that went over it, but I put it back for this pic).

drewkaree

Here, you can see where the wiring for the phone ran behind the air duct, and in the left side, the plug that has to be disconnected. Again, you can see the holes for the friction fittings, and lemme tell ya, they're the BEST fittings I've ever come across. All the rest of the friction fittings I had to deal with for this were a walk in the park compared to just THOSE TWO! At this point, it's fairly simple to figure out what I did. Disconnect the white plug in that pic, and remove that wire for the phone.

drewkaree

From here on out, the pics are WAY better, and they also show the phone already removed. The second-most frustrating part for me was figuring out how to remove the phone itself. I had pics of me removing all the screws and blah blah blah, but none of it was necessary. I won't even begin to tell you the lengths I took to remove the panel the phone was attached to. Suffice it to say, you're benefitting from my idiocy!

What you'll need to do now is remove the tray the phone is attached to. These are nice easy gentle friction fittings that come out quite easily. Start on either side, but start near the back like the pic indicates

drewkaree

Be gentle with the back part of the tray, as it CAN crack, but it's the best place to start, since you can easily get a tool underneath the tray at that point. Now all you need to do is gently go down one side, as you should be able to see here:

drewkaree

And make your way around the tray to the other side of the tray at the back. If you notice, the pic above doesn't show this large a gap. This is because I worked my way around the tray little by little. DO NOT try to pull one side out in one fell swoop, or you could crack a fitting or some other delicate piece of plastic that costs brazillions of dollars to replace. As you work your way around the tray, the gap will widen as shown in this pic – it didn't get to this point all at once!

drewkaree

Viola! The tray, completely removed. Here, you can see the friction fittings on my tray. You can also see the hack job they did on the tray when they installed the phone. Maybe it's just me, but I'd have thought a Dremel or some other tool could have been used. This looks like a hand pruners had been used (don't ask how I might know that!). Anyway, the butcher job on the upper right area was covered nicely by the phone tray.

drewkaree

Now, here's where you get to learn from my (HUGE) mistake. I'm showing this in the order it SHOULD have been done, not in the order I DID do it! Here's a pic of my tray after the phone tray was removed. All that you'll need to do is unscrew all the screws from the underside once you've got the tray removed from the center armrest console. In this pic, you should be able to see the 4 screw holes they used to attach the phone tray. It took me half an hour to realize this, after I had already gone beyond the point of no return with MY method. Don't make the same mistake. 2 minutes, and I could have been done! You can also see a better angle of the job they did hacking a hole just to run a phone into there.

drewkaree

Once the phone was removed, all I needed to do was replace the phone tray. This is my temporary (probably permanent due to slackitude) fix: buy some black SOMETHING. I wanted some felt, but ended up going with a black napkin I found on sale. I had an old plastic foam-core For Sale sign that I trimmed to fit, and the wife cut the fabric to fit, sprayed a little spray glue (I used 3M something-or-other – find it in the paint section....I think it was the “33” stuff) on it, and wrapped the fabric to fit around it.

drewkaree

In some of the pics, you might think the fabric is see-through since you can make out some letters underneath the fabric, but I promise you, in daily use, it looks just like the pic below (this pic taken without flash). The flash from the camera is what made it see-through, kinda like a few paparazzi shots of certain women in black dresses! Anyhoo, that's the final result, and hopefully, this'll help a few folks take the step to remove their phones and regain the storage space! For me, I now have a place to stick my mp3 player along with the FM transmitter!

PureDrifter

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reasonably well made tut