I had to pull off my drivers side inner door panel today. I tried to be as careful as I could but the dang things broke apart at the clip mounts. Now the clips won't stay in so I can mount my panel.

What are my options? I thought about those black plastic push thingie majigs.
Any thoughts???

Here's my nice original door panel.............

 

i used some of the longer push trees. when i put them on the door panels i used my little grinder to make the gap fit the trees then hot glued them in place.

 

1. Do not panic, lol. Look at what I did to save a set with the chrome strip after some moron in the JY just ripped them off....
2. Go to the parts store and get some of these....the GM ones are longer and have a bigger head than the Ford ones, and they will fit better in the slot. You still might have to grind a bit to get them in there? But you will be ok.
3. 2 part epoxy and or JB weld overlay/reinforce whats left. I also made metal reinforcement plates for where the door pull screws goes thru. (see pics)
4. 2" wide velcro is my back up plan for making them stick real good along with the longer GM push buttons.
5. Notch the panel (where the 2 notches are in my pic), it will fit tighter to the door if you do, and clear the 2 bolt heads that hold it out a bit. And no worries, the finger pull cups cover the notchs. Also swap over to the metal pull cups....

Or get the old metal tabs and proceed till you need them off again. Also a door panel tool set.....http://www.harborfreight.com/5-piece...set-67021.html
will save you lots of this problem in the future.

 

I prefer the metal clips myself. They aren't as hard release when you remove the panel, but I think they hold the panel on better.

 

They also make a special tool for removing the panels although sometimes the plastic is too far gone and will break anyway

 

Yeah I used the special tool but the plastic is too brittle. I think I'll try the longer plastic push tabs and some epoxy as shown above.

 

The White GM push tabs work like a dream, they're what i used when i installed door speakers. didnt need epoxy.