Spent about an hour and a half trying to get the scuttle panel off tho fit my power cable today. Resorted to trying to lever it up with a steel rule - result cracked scuttle panel, ironicly i went back to my trusty fingers and it came up, bloody typical.

I found it came up from the edge of the car instead of from the middle like some have said, I guess the trick is to find the sweet spot, keep trying and DONT RESORT TO TOOLS unless you plan to replace cover anyway, i`m gonna change the pollen filter while i'm in there.

anyone give good directions for pulling off lower door seals without damage?

Mine was such a pig to do I had to ask the dealer to do it for me - they carefully removed it and I set to work on their forecourt one saturday morning, then they kindly replaced it when I'd finished .

They did warn me that even they have cracked windscreens getting them off so care is the order of the day.

Not sure what you mean with the door seals but if it's the strips that run down the inside of the car on the carpet they will pop off with gentle prising (all the clips are metal and slide in from the side, just remove them from the car body with pliers and re-insert into the slotted grooves on the trim, then press back into position.)

I managed to run a 16mm2 power cable down one side and 3 pairs of audio plus a cd changer control and amp remote lead down the other and all the trims went back on with no noticeable bulges.

Warm the scuttle panel with a hairdryer before attempting to remove when cold. It reduces the chances of the plastic cracking.

Warm the scuttle panel with a hairdryer before attempting to remove when cold. It reduces the chances of the plastic cracking.

I did that and it worked a treat. Was still a swine to get off though as I never know how far I can push these things without them breaking. After reading other other posts I thought I'd cracked the screen for a second when it finally did come off - it made quite a snapping noise.

Regarding lower door seals - try and get your finger tips under the lower edge and they should just pop out. Once you've run the cable underneath line them up with one hand and give them a good firm smack with the palm of the other to pop them back into place.

I think the hairdryer trick would've made the differance as it was pretty cold when i did the job, I wish my dealer would hurry with the replacement though, Power cable is all the way to the boot now just gotta run the RCA's and speaker cable down the other side.

update: got my new scuttle panel on and the Stereo is all in and working.

Its just practice. I have to take them off daily as VW have a recall at the moment which means we have to pop the Passat ones off all the time.

Trick is t start as mentioned at the very edge, pop it up and work along to the middle. Spray a bit of WD40 in the grove where the trim fits before you pop it back on and it slides in just perfect.