Going to paint my car soon. How do I get the ground effects off the bottom of the door? I see that there are 2 bolts one at each end of the door (mine are rusted so bad that I will have to grind them off), but what is holding the middle on and how do I get them off with minimal or no breakage? If the mounts and or clips break, so be it, I have devised a plan to rehang the panels if this happens, but I would still like to save as much as possible. There is no need for anyone to use what we call at work "Repair by Hammer".

I have a Haynes book for F-Bodies but it doesn't go into specifics on removing these parts.

 

You'll have to take the door panel off. There are 3 more thread cutting nuts inside the door holding it on.

 

Thanx for the info.

Are the thread cutting nuts on plastic dowls that are part of the plastic moulding? (and going to break off if I try to remove them conventionaly with a socket?)

 

No problem. The door pieces are actually fiberglass, the 'studs' are metal and IIRC, screwed into place. I'm sure it would be possible to break one if you really try but, thread cutting nuts aren't all that stout (just cheaply stamped out of sheet metal).
Here's kind of how the backside of the fx piece looks...

 

Thanx for the pic!

That helps out a lot! I thought they were plastic. Looks like it won't be so bad after all.