Removing Armrests

[Fatalfunnel]

Hello,

New here, looks like a great resource to have around. Anyway, I recently bought a 97 Cherokee Country. Looks and seems to be in excellent condition except for the armrests (the ones on the inside of the doors), both armrests are "peeling", that is padded vinyl covering is coming off of them. Apparently someone has tried to fix this before in a fractional posterior sort of way and had no luck, so now I have old glue of some sort to deal with also. Sooooo, I tried to get the armrest off by removing the 3 screws that were obvious. Nothing.....they still will not budge. Are they also mounted through the panel to the panel, requiring panel removal? Any tips on this project would be appreciated.

Thanks
TonyG

[scoobyxj]

They're plastic welded to the door pannel. The screws do the main load transfer to the door when you pull on it. So if you should be able to cut them off to fix the vinel, and use some screws with big fender washers to reattach them to the door pannel.

[Fatalfunnel]

If I "cut" these plastic welds, will the armrest be secure after I re-attatch if I just use the screws that came in it?