I would not suggest doing this yourself, mainly because these solenoids, and their operation/alignment and mounting must be flawless... If you dont know what you are doing, dont be surprised if you run into problems later on. And as far as shaving yourself, I would rather have a body shop do mine, because it is a difficult process to look perfect (and I mean inspection perfect) I would not want to look down the side profile of my car and see a ding/dent or any impression from where the work was done. You can get the work done pretty cheap compared to the prices I've heard quoted - I live in Canada, and I'm having it done for under 400 CDN. If you want the labour/paint cost to go down, you could always have them only paint from the trim/body line and upwards... BTW I have spent the last year coming up with a fool proof backup plan system that should be able to prevent/get you out of any sort of glitch/failure/seize/freeze up that you may encounter, I would recommend getting in touch with me before having your handles shaved. Also, if you are skeptical about the poppers, have them installed while your handles are still on the car (and you have the option of deactivating your door handles once you do that) That way, if you ever find that they seize up on you, or you dont like the way they work, all you have inversted in is the price of a kit (which you can sell) and the shop install labor price. I am going down this route b/c I dont have enough cash right now to have the poppers installed AND the shaving done, and I dont want my car on my driveway right now with the handles on and operational, since a few months ago my car had been broken into by the thieves prying under the door handle and messing around with the rods inside to gain entry. This way if they do pry under the handles now and hit the right rod to unlock the door, they wont be able to use my (de-activated) door handle to open the door once its unlocked.... Trust me I've looked at this procedure from all angles, and I would like to think I have it all mapped out. If ANYONE has any questions or concerns, by all means, post your questions and I'll try my best to answer them. BTW - would you be shaving all four doors on your car or just the front two? The reason I ask, is because most popper kits (the better ones atleast) come with a 7 channel control unit, and if you plan on using any sort of remote starter/trunk release/alarm, you MAY run into issues depending on how many other remote items/features you have - though there are channel expanders for some units, so that is also an option for some people.
Later
Landon,
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