This guide will walk you through the process of installing the Toyobaru (2022+) Vent Panel.
STEP 1: Remove the Air Vent
Many thanks to Kevin Vo, for allowing me to use a few screenshots from his YouTube video for the first few photos of this installation guide!
Pop off the trim panel on the left size of your dash. There should be a gap at the bottom of the panel that you can use to pop the bottom of the panel out. Then yank it off.
With the panel removed, you will notice a single screw towards the bottom of the panel. You should remove it. This will free the entire left lower panel for removal. Pull it towards the rear of the car and it will come loose. You can place it out of the way for now.
You will now see the single screw holding the air vent in place on the lower right side. Remove it. Then grab the entire vent assembly and pull it towards the rear of the vehicle to remove it.
STEP 2: Disassembling the Air Vent
Take the air vent somewhere you can work on it safely without scuffing the trim. (In these photos I'm working on a wood table, but I suggest laying a towel/blanket under it for added protection. Flip the vent over.
We need to separate the vent channel from the outer housing. You will see three clips. Use a flathead screwdriver or a butter knife to pop the vent channel free and remove it. You can set aside the outer trim.
On the back of the vent channel, you will see a single screw in the center. This screw holds the rotating vent vane assembly in place. This is what we will be replacing, so remove the screw, and the vent vane assembly will pull out from the front. Set it aside. (Screw the screw into the vent vane assembly so that it doesn't get lost in case you later decide to revert to stock!)
STEP 3: Drilling the Big, Scary Hole
We need to provide a pathway for the switch wires. As such, we will drill a 5/8" hole in the side of the vent channel. In the future, if you want to revert to stock, you will only need to cover this hole with a piece of tape. The size and location of this hole is extremely important. Observe the vent channel, and take note of the protruding "tab" on the outside. This tab locates the 12 o'clock (top) position of the channel. We need to drill the hole at 6 o'clock (bottom) position, directly opposite. It also needs to be not only perfectly centered at the exact bottom, but also centered directly on the curved section of the vent channel. Look at the two photos below for reference on exactly where it should be drilled.
Note that typical drill bits tend to wander significantly, and larger bits also tend to grab the plastic aggressively, resulting in a messy cut. As such, I suggest starting with a tiny bit to ensure you get the pilot hole properly centered more easily, and then slowly work your way up to the proper size in several increments. I used four drill bits of increasing size to drill this hole. I also cheated, and the first three of those drill bits are bits specifically designed for cutting plastic. They have a much sharper point and cut through the plastic smoothly and without fuss. The fourth bit was a "normal" bit, and as such I needed to use extremely light pressure and simply let it slowly wear its way through. If you pressed harder, it would grab the plastic violently. This is the only "complicated" part of this install, so take your time and do it right! Another alternative is to use a stepped Unibit, but make sure you stop at the appropriate size and don't over-drill the hole!
STEP 4: Installing the Switch Panel
Prepare the hole you just drilled by installing the provided rubber grommet. This will protect the wires from chafing. Then take the switch panel, noting the orientation it will be installed (a similar tab at the top), and start inserting the wires through the hole from the inside. This can be a bit finicky as there are a lot of wires, and the hole is just big enough for all of them. Note that each switch has an NO and an NC wire, and most folks will only use one or the other. If you want to simplify the wiring a bit, you can de-pin wires you don't intend on using from each pigtail harness first, but all of the wires will fit regardless!
Slowly seat the switch panel into position, gently pulling the wires from the outside in the process to take out the slack. Take your time, and make sure you aren't overstressing them. Note some of them might wind up on the wrong side of the protruding shaft inside the vent channel. You can use a long thin object to maneuver the wires to the correct side of the shaft which will give you a bit more length. The panel is fully inserted when it protrudes about 1 cm above the edge of the vent channel.
STEP 5: Reassembly
Now place the vent channel upright on the work surface and grab the trim piece. Note the orientation of the trim piece. There is a protruding c-shaped groove on the inside at the 12 o'clock position of the trim piece that inserts into the similarly-shaped protrusion at the top of the vent panel. Then just push down and finally squeeze the two pieces together until the three tabs snap back into place.
Congratulations! You've done it! All that's left is to wire the crap out of everything, and then reinstall the vent into the vehicle. I highly recommend using quick-connects on the ends of all your wires so that you can easily disconnect them all in the future.
How you wire your panel is up to you. Each use case is different, and so I do not provide any specific guidance for wiring any of my panels. I also assume no responsibility for you being a moron and doing something incredibly dumb with your wiring! However, I do offer some basic tips:
Relays, relays, relays. If you are going to be powering devices that draw any significant amount of current, always use relays to power those devices, not just to ensure you don't exceed the rated capacity of the switch, but also to ensure you don't exceed the capacity of the wiring you are using to power to the switches. If you don't know what a relay is, Google can explain everything, but in a nutshell: you use the switch to trigger the relay, and it is the RELAY which powers the device.
The fuse box in the cabin is often times a great power source if you are drawing minimal current, powering relays, or using these switches as signal wires, rather than load wires. Specifically the fuses for the cigarette lighter circuits, which are typically fused for 15A each. (Confirm their location and rating by consulting the diagram in your Owner's Manual, or the diagram on the fuse box cover.) They are switched power, and will turn off when the car is off. If you aren't carrying much load, you can provide power to all of those switches from one wire going to one of those fuse slots, in conjunction with an add-a-fuse adapter.
The bolt securing the fuse box to the internal structure of the car is often a great ground location, but any bolt that connects directly to the metal structure of the vehicle should be a decent ground, so you can probably find one near where the switch panel is.
These switches have more leads than a typical, "basic" switch, because they can be wired up in different ways depending on how you want the switch to function, and how you want the LED to operate. The guides below show some common wiring setups depending on what you want to achieve.
