How to remove the centre console

[ibalfe]

I have a 99 2.6 Cabriolet which has developed a major leak somewhere. The rear passenger side carpet was submerged in water (as was a lot of wiring) so I'm attempting to remove the whole carpet to dry it out and trace the source of the water.

The thing I'm stuck on is removing the rear section of the centre console. The screws either end are out, electrics disconnected but I've no idea how to lift it over the handbrake. It looks like I have to do something with the handbrake lever first. Anyone able to shed some light??

Many thanks,
Ian

[chairman_mo]

According to the manual you insert something into the handbrake grip and it comes off. I tried this and couldn't shift it so using a controlled amount of brute force I forced the console over the handbrake grip without doing any damage and also got it back on without any damage.

However, I wouldn't recommend this approach but I was desperate to get the vile blue LEDs out of the aux gauge panel and resorted to any foul means.

[ibalfe]

Thanks. I enlisted the help of a friend who was a bit more confident with things like this and he used the brute force method also. At least it is off now but I will spend a bit more time looking at the handbrake before trying to force it back on again.

At least I have been able to get the carpet out at last after a lot of fiddling and removing some of the lower parts of the dashboard. Now it's going to take a little while to dry out whilst I work out where the leak is coming from.

[BoraHighline]

The handbrake handle has a clip that slides underneath the plastic cover of the handbrake holding it in place. This needs to be released to allow the handbrake handle to be pulled off and then you can remove the plastic cover which will then allow the removal of the centre consol. My cover was damaged so i butchered it to remove it and then i could release the clip with no problems. I have been told there is a way of releasing the clip with the cover in situ but god knows how though.