How do I dis-mantle the dashboard on this thing.

'07 Camry.

Please.

Anyone.

It's God Awful in there.

 

I can e-mail you the 41 page instrument panel disassembly manual.

Do you want that?

 

looks like a lot of work, if you remove the radio and glove box you should be able to see most of the underside of the dash including the cabin filter location which is paper and might be where the guy was hanging out

tim

 

I got him!

He was sucking off the condensate line coming out of the evaporator. Center dash all the way back and down. That's how he kept hydrated.

Both underside dash sections hastily ripped out as well as the entire center console and various appendages.

I'm letting the Ozium soak in and contemplating free-basing some Xanax at the moment.

As soon as my nerves calm a bit I'll start trying to put the car back together. Hopefully there won't be any codes or faults. I had to start the car to get the shifter down for clearance while a bunch of stuff was disconnected.

That smell... it's stuck in my gut. I think I'm gonna puke now.

 

Did you photo the sucker? I'd like to have seen where he was trapped.

 

Oh yes I did! Camera phone, but better than nothing. I didn't want to befoul my nice Nikon with that mess.

Little head laying down, eyes open, glaring at me. Rigor had set in and his claws had clenched into the carpet padding requiring a grisly extraction for which I will likely need therapy at some point.

The pictures might not be suitable for public display, but I'll email them to anyone who wants them. I'll include the dash destruction sequence too if you want.

Bleach, Ozium, Hot Air.... nothing is working guys.

The dash panels had dried urine on the inside.

This is about the nastiest thing I've ever had to deal with.

 

gah-ROSS!

 

Be glad you didn't travel across state lines. They could have nailed you for transporting wildlife illegally without a permit.

Trying to make light of your situation... I've dealt with maggots who suddenly took over a large potted plant outside. That's pure nastiness. But at least it was outside and in a gravel bed so I could just keep pouring boiling water (to kill the maggots) and bleach (to try to kill the smell... didn't work. Had to make a lethal brew of bleach, Pine Sol, etc. Insanity. Neighbors three houses over were wondering where the dead body was... garbage crew wouldn't even TAKE the reeking garbage can the next day.

 

Congrats...I think? Hope you can get the smell and contaminants out, yuck! Not a fun job and very frustrating.

Maybe if you hang 25-30 pine tree air fresheners along the inside edge of the headliner it would help. May even start a fad!!

Sorry, it is one of those things you have to make light of since it is such a bad situation, hope you understand. Ozium would be my choice, hope it works for you, good luck.

 

Yep... I ran out of Ozium this morning. 15% bleach solution. Forced hot air w/ neg pressure. Still Stinks.

I scrubbed out every piece of dashboard component. Managed to do the shift rattle TSB and tighten my parking brake cable while in there. I swabbed out all of my climate control ducts.

I just got back from Whale Mart... the ~only~ fitting end to a rat tale as this. $160 bucks later I've got Febreeze, an activated charcoal thing, two bottles of some hillbilly stink-be-gone, made in Kentucky. I got all new carpeted mats (keep cheap ones over the factory ones). Got new front and back windshield shades, copious amounts of brake cleaner and window cleaner, leather cleaner and a clay bar because I even feel like stripping and re-waxing my frikking paint after this.

And the farker had only been dead for a day. Can you imagine if it took me a while to find it?? It's 96 degrees right now with huge gray Nimbus stacks to the north and east funneling large amounts of humidity in here.

Gag! Back to work.