Fender flare installation on non-flared Tacomas: tutorial

THE GUIDE ITSELF STARTS IN THE NEXT POST

Alternate title:
Nitori's Flare club for men: I'm not just the president, I'm a client!

I've put together another one of my guides on how to OEM+ your Tacoma and put factory parts onto a truck that wasn't equipped with it originally. My latest project: the often requested fender flares.

This is a much bigger undertaking than you might think, at least for the first person making the leap. There's a good deal of missing hardware, as non-flare bodies are missing holes for the fender flare clips. The "proper" way to do this would be to upgrade your fenders, but that's extremely cost prohibitive. You would need to buy 2 front fenders, 2 bedsides, and the front bumper: total cost of roughly $1600 before paint!! Drilling your existing fenders is not an option in my opinion either because you would have to make 10 holes per side, per fender, with very little room for error. I'm not going to do either of those things. So then, that leaves us with using the existing fasteners and a little bit of creativity with our placement of 3M tape. Good 3M tape applied properly is tenacious.

After installing my flares with tape as reinforcement I can say that they are solidly attached and I have no doubts to their longevity. I've now taken the truck offroading and through the wash, and they have stayed put.

 

STEP 1: THE PARTS YOU NEED

Okay, let's start with the parts and supplies you need.

First off are the flares themselves. These are ostensibly the best part numbers to use, I would advise trying to find them used as list price is pretty steep:
75871-04900
75872-04900
75873-04090
75874-04090

This will get you a set of matte flares that can also be painted to match if you want. Apparently there is some difference in the part numbers for the front (and only the front?) being "paint to match," but sometimes making sense of a Toyota parts catalog is a feeble endeavor. Seeing as how matte are the most popular anyways, I guess it hardly matters at this point.

Next you need rear bedside mouldings that will fit the flares, as your non-flared Tacoma has longer mouldings that will interfere with the fit of the flare. These are about $20-$25 a side at your dealer.
75632-04010
75642-04010

Finally, you need a few little grommets and extra hardware.
90189-06013 (grommet) x4 (old p/n is 90189-06236)
and
90159-60603 (screw) x6

In terms of other supplies, grab 2 rolls of 3M 38583. That part number should be 1/4" wide, 5 yards.



And finally, go to CVS or a similar local drug store and get a box of isopropyl alchohol prep wipes. They're 99 cents a box, so you have no excuse not to wipe down everything that is going to have an adhesive stuck to it. Just remember to wait a moment for it to evaporate.


That should have you sorted as far as supplies. Tools wise, you really only need a 10mm socket.

 

STEP 2: PREP WORK ON YOUR FLARES

First order of business is to get any of the hardware we can't reuse out of the way.

If you have bought a used set of flares, you may find that you have lingering orange or blue clips hanging out. Grab onto them with a pair of needle nose pliers like so:

and rotate 90 degrees in either direction to pop them out.

Now take look at your front flares. They will have protruding tabs that would interface with the front bumper. Alas, we have to clip them off. Grab some wire cutters and clip them off by clipping both legs:

You'll be left with some nubs of raised plastic:

To properly fit the fenders you now have to grab a sharp knife or razor blade and whittle off what is left of those clips so that you are left with a flat surface:

I used a knife and a bit of sandpaper to make it as flat as possible.

Wipe those new flats down with your alcohol wipes, then apply a double stack of 3M tape on these as single thickness is just the tiniest hair too thin. Remember, don't leave that red protective tape sandwiched when you make a double stack. Sticky on sticky contact.


Moving on, it's now time to remove the old icky tape if you have used flares. If you have new flares you will have a fresh surface to stick onto, so don't worry.

Peel back on the old gummy stuff and keep lifting and picking it off out of its channel:


Once that's all done, clean the flares and use your alcohol wipes to get it ready for the new 3M tape.

Apply the 3M tape in the same channel you peeled it out of, being careful to keep it as evenly applied as possible. It doesn't have to be perfect, but do your best to keep it from wandering too much.

Front pattern:


Rear pattern:




The flares are now prepared for their install.

 

STEP 3: PREP WORK ON YOUR TRUCK

Go to the self serve car wash or bust out your power washer and go nuts on the wheel wells. Get them as clean as you have the patience to make it! Rinse it out with the pressure wand, degrease, scrub, whatever floats your boat. This makes everything so much easier in the long run, trust me.

Now, take 2 of your 90189-06236 grommets, and look under your truck, right behind your front wheels on the body. You will see a square hole:

Pop one of those grommets in on each side! It should make a nice satisfying click.


Now move to the rear of the truck. Those long bedside mouldings behind your rear wheel wells need to be replaced with the short flare version:


These are very easy to remove and replace. First unbolt the only 10mm bolt holding it on, and then you can easily reach up and around inside to squeeze the two clips holding it in place. They should release with just finger-pressure, you won't need to crush them with pliers or anything.

Not the greatest picture, but you can see that the clips are easily reached.

Once the 2 clips are released and the bolt is out you can gently pull the adhesive off. Don't yank, just firmly pull from front to back and it will come right off. Do a spot clean on where the old moulding came off, as I guarantee you there will be dirt chilling behind it.
Now you'll see there are 3 empty square holes:

The forward most empty hole gets the remaining 90189-06236 grommets, again on both sides. Clicks right in next to its existing neighbor:


Installation of the new moulding is pretty straightforward, you click its 2 clips into their respective holes, peel the protective cover off the tape, stick to the body, and then reuse the 10mm bolt to reattach it to the truck, only 1 slot back from its original home:


Your truck is now ready to accept the flares!

 

STEP 4: INSTALLING THE FLARES

Now, finally the fun part! I'll try to make this as straightforward as possible. Now that you've gotten everything prepared, this step should be a breeze. Installing the flares should go pretty easily even for a single person, but if you want you could definitely have a helper to help maneuver the flare and hold it in place while you fiddle with the 10mm socket and start the screws.

I highly recommend test fitting at least one front and one rear flare with the 3M unpeeled, just so you have a general idea of how it goes on the truck. This makes your "live run" even easier.

Also before you apply the flare do another spot clean, and be sure to get out your alcohol wipes and wipe down the body. The wipes are moist enough for you to really go wild so be sure you get all over the flare crease. I can't stress this enough, you want a very clean surface to adhere to.

The following are some reference shots for you to get an idea of what you are looking at for each wheel well. Pardon the fact that some shots are of a blue truck, I'm trying to make this as minimally confusing as I have Rokblokz mud flaps on my truck and they use different screws!

Front wheels:
You will use 2 new 90159-60603 screws per side, and re-use one.

Front of well, 1 screw only:


Top of well, use your 2 new screws to screw the little "flaps" into place:


Rear of well, 4 existing screws, 3 remain, last one is reused to secure bottom of flare:


Rear wheels:
You will use 1 new 90159-60603 screw per side and re-use two.

Front of well, 3 existing screws, only one remains, save the other two.

(Ignore the bolts that are not part of the splash guard)

Top of well, 2 screws reused from the front of the well:


Rear of well, 3 existing screws remain, use your new screw to secure the bottom of the flare:



One last tip... When peeling the 3M before placing your flare on the body, only peel a few inches of your tape protector:


This makes re-positioning if needed WAY easier and limits the potential for disaster.

Once you have everything lined up, pull on that little tab of tape protector and expose the rest of your 3M:


then once it is all exposed, press firmly along the whole flare to adhere it to the body.

Check all your fasteners for tightness, give another firm press to make sure that pressure sensitive adhesive is activated, and then wipe up any mess you may have left on your flares!

And that's about it! Enjoy the flares!

 

F@ck.... already looking on eBay for some flares.... my wife is going to hate me! Hahaha

 

In, but it already looks like a lot of work.

 

You need to up your bro level with a set of flares though! I just did all the hard work figuring out what parts you need. You just need to buy the parts and use tape and bolts.

 

Bumping with a few edits, also I just took my truck to the wash and power washed, scrubbed, etc. on the flares and they did not budge. I even used the "air gun" thing that fires a serious flow of air to dry the car, aimed directly at where I thought the weakest attachment would be and they didn't so much as wobble.

 

Nice writeup... gonna wait for birthday and Christmas to get this... wife didn't aprove the funds... hahahah

 

Installed mine using the same methods! got three on just right but the fourth one didn't stick and now has a gap that i can see in my rear view mirror. wish I took the time to do it right the first time so i don't have to reinstall one of the flares

 

Glad it worked out for you, mostly!

Your 4th flare is why I recommended test fitting and going slow, by the way. Don't feel bad for one second, I messed up one of my rear flares as well and had to re-peel and stick it!

If you have your 2 rolls of 3M you should have juuuuuuust barely enough to re-apply one flare.

 

Any idea what the difference for rear flare part numbers 75873-04900 and 75874-04900 might be? Several sites have these, for significantly cheaper. I thought it might have been a typo on the website, but many other e-stores also have them. The particular site I linked to, doesn't have the 04090 pair as far as I could tell.

Another interesting find was my local parts store (Conicelli) lists the 04090's as unavailable, but they have the 04900's.

Either we are in the midst of a stop sale, possibly a part number change, or something else? *shrugs*

I'm probably not going to buy new, just thought I would bring it to attention in case it causes another member confusion.

Edit: Oookay, so one of the front flares is also not available at conicelli, but the other side IS available. *scratches head*

 

Toyota likes to play musical chairs with their parts numbers sometimes- and I know well enough from my fog light tutorial that the parts catalog can be wrong too.

All I can do is report this stuff to the best of my knowledge.

As far as the rear flare part numbers, I'm going to speculate that there are paint to match (primered) and "textured" (Off-Road trim)... I had always found it suspect that there was such a difference for fronts but none listed for rears, but apparently you've now found rears are available in 2 flavors.



Where is the "drinking the frustration away" emote...

 

The most frustrating thing is that even the parts desk has a difficult time figuring it out. I'll inquire when my stalk comes in (today hopefully), but I'm assuming there will be no concrete answer. Perhaps this can mean a hefty discount from a "disgruntled" customer ...

 

Yep, you were correct. Okay, after a few emails it's confirmed by Conicelli that the 04900's have smooth texture (sport/SR5) and require paint. The 04060 and 04090 are textured flares.

 

Looks great!

 

I already have flares but read anyway. Good read @Nitori!

 

sub'd

 

Update:

If your local dealer also does not sell the flares on the website, it is likely because they are tired of returns (from tabs breaking during shipment).

Conicelli decided to sell me a set, but only if I picked them up. After explaining that the tabs would be removed anyway, they still would not ship ... which is understandable. Unfortunately, there were no damaged sets available for purchase.

I'm paying $611.86 (+ tax) for the four flares listed in the 2nd post of this thread, plus the extra bits. Ouch, I know ... but I'm getting a bit tired of the incessant searching. The next best quote I got locally was $681.52 (+ tax), so that takes the sting off a little bit.