I looked at the installation instructions and it appears unavoidable to me.

 

I haven't done it yet although I did make an abortive attempt (incidentally I discovered a few plastic clips missing under the front plastic cover <sigh>)...anyways I quit to regroup when I saw that the LED strip is attached to the fascia FAR down from where I could possibly ever get to. So yes, fascia must come off, and I was not prepared to do that late on a Sunday afternoon.

I downloaded and examined the instructions and they reference OTHER instructions that were not available to download. No one has done a teardown video yet, and as far as I know there is no service manual available to consumers yet.

I took my car in to have a scratch touched up and a minor dull spot polished up that I noticed on PDI, and took the opportunity to talk to the body shop about the front fascia.

I asked if THEY could get the procedures referenced in the instructions and they claimed they had no more access to them than I did. Putting that crazy notion aside, they had worked on an EEV front collision repair and said it was no big deal...I want to do it myself but they offered to do it for about $150 CAD (I'm sure I'll regret not taking them up on it).

So I talked to them about the front fascia:

Under the hood, the top covers and trim come off that cover the lightbar (this was as far as I got on my first attempt). Remove any mounting screws you can reach.
Remove the front fender liners
Remove the front fender wheelhouse lips a AT THE FRONT ONLY and let them hang. The front clips are reusable. If you try to take the entire fender wheelhouse lips off most of the clips will have to be replaced, so just remove the ones that interface with the front fascia.
Remove the bottom fascia mounting screws.
Fascia should pull forwards...it's friction clipped at the fender interface. They said the motion was forward and slightly upwards.
Probably a good idea to have 2 people remove the fascia, and you'll want some blankets to lay it onto. Remember that there are parking sensors, etc, plugged into the fascia. Having said that, it doesn't necessarily have to come all the way OFF, you just need to get it forward enough to get to the mounting points for the lightbar. Once you get that far, you can probably get into the grill and get at the original bowtie, wiring connector, etc. The new bowtie comes with wires and connector pins that have to go into the front lighting block in the correct locations.

That's all I know until I go back in sometime this winter to try again.

If I get there first, I'll take lots of pics. If someone else beats me to it, that'd be fine also! Also, maybe someone else will have better luck getting their dealer to share official "front fascia removal" instructions and can post them here.

 

Please post pics and notes when available, DarkDan72

 

So one of my last projects during the holidays was to get back to my lighted bowtie installation. Recall that I made an attempt last fall on a Sunday afternoon and discovered that when Chevy built this car they started with the bowtie and built the entire car around it. Not really, but it was much harder to get to than I originally thought, and I wanted a few days when I didn't need the car before I pulled it apart in case something went wrong.

The entire front fascia DOES need to come off. That is a bitter pill to swallow. What's even worse is I could come up with no documentation that would help me find all the clips, bolts, etc. There doesn't even seem to be illustrations of aftermarket fascia's for the collision market (like on CarID) yet that I could reference to locate the mount points. The document that you CAN find for the bowtie itself basically starts after you have the fascia off and upside down on the bench...no help there. So I resorted to my old tried and true method of removing logical fasteners and then giving the occasional tug to see what moves and what doesn't, then searching in the areas where there was resistance.

This is NOT a project for the faint of heart. You're dealing with a lot of plastic and there are many opportunities to break stuff, permanently deform stuff, or scratch stuff. Depending on your skill level, you might be better off letting the dealer do this job. For reference I am NOT a professional mechanic but I've been working on machinery since I was a kid (about to turn 50), and am a very experienced and well-equipped amateur. If this is you, and you have more nerve than common sense like me, then you can do this, especially taking advantage my experience and what I learned on this one. Best viewed on a PC screen.

First thing...do yourself a favor and give yourself some room to work.

See that? I have way too many projects. I also have two lifts, a 4 post and a 2 post, and I elected to do this job on the ground. The 2 post would probably have given the best access to the car but I had a tractor on it. That's another thing...if you do this job on the ground, you're gonna be getting up and down a LOT. Keep that in mind. Anyway this pic shows BARELY enough room to do this job. No less. Right away there was an issue...how to I jack the car up? Supposed to use the pinch welds on the sides but there's no room in this bay for that. I elected to put rubber pads on 2 floor jacks and lift each front a-arm, then support the pinch welds with jack stands. Once the car is up, get those front wheels off. Holy crow those are heavy wheels and tires!

Before we really get into it, you're going to encounter 2 types of screws. They are both the same thread size (designed to go into those slide on metal clips) and may vary in length here and there, so keep track. One is Torx head screw (use a T15 bit) that has in integral washer. It's used on smooth plastic trim panel type locations that need the load distributed. For example the fiberglass fender liners, smooth plastic of the fascia to splash shield interface, etc. The other is a Hex head screw (use a 7mm socket) that is used on thicker, more structural items like support brackets, the underside splash shield, etc. Make it easy on yourself and keep track of what goes where and you'll save time reassembling. You'll also encounter a plastic push pin here and there, the type that you have to pry the head up on to release.

Start by removing the forward screws and push pin that hold up the fender liners. You'll also have to remove the forward "drip edges" that interface the front of the liner to the splash shield. The liners are fiberglass (I think) and are nicely designed to be folded at the 12 o'clock position, so just fold them back and tuck them behind the spindles. Now they're out of the way.

Admire all the bits and bobs under that shield. At some point, notice the two fascia retaining bolts that need to be removed.
Left side:

Right side (behind the horns):

Also, since you read my whole set of instructions before starting this yourself (you did, right?) you know I recommend disconnecting the forward camera connector from the right side of the fascia (actually visible in the above photo) as well as the large body connector on the left side NOW while the fascia is still mounted. It can be done later, but there's a risk you'll damage the wiring, so do it now. These are the only two electrical connections to the fascia. I remind you of this later on when we get to the point where I did it and realized it could/should have been done sooner.

Remove all the underside fascia to splash shield screws. I believe there were 4 across the center and 4 at each corner.

 

I elected to remove the entire front splash shield in an effort to gain visibility, access mounting points, etc. It wasn't a big deal, although strictly speaking it probably wasn't necessary. I actually took it off in two pieces (removed the left hand "wing" separately, which made it easier to wiggle it out, because the parts all "shingle" together in a particular order, and it doesn't just drop down. One of the push pins was on this shield and the rest were hex screws.

So now, the most stressful part, was the fender edges.

Held on with plastic push clips galore, the types with the barbs that push through the sheet metal. I decided I needed to make a tool to release these clips safely, and that took some time, mainly to experiment with the hole size needed. Basically the tool is a piece of 1/8" strapping I had laying around, with a hole in the end of it of the right size. I'll save you an hour or more, and tell you that you want to drill this with a "P" drill bit (0.323"). "O" was too small (just 0.007" smaller), and you want every bit of push you can get, so I wouldn't want to go up 0.005" to 21/64. Use a "P". I also bent a 30 deg offset into the end which really helps next to folded sheet metal edges, etc. The strap was about an inch wide and maybe 6" long. I ended up having to grind the working end of it a little bit in order to fit into the bottom clip. Ignore the two holes in the middle; they were already in the strap and serve no purpose here.

Here's one of those hateful clips:

And the tool in use. In reality, you have to do this inside the fender but this gives you the idea. Put the tool SQUARELY over the barbs and PUSH. Simultaneously, push the fender edge against the fender to relieve the pressure on the plastic barbs. If it works, you can almost feel a "click" and then the fender edge can be pulled away from the fender.

Start at the bottom front of the fender edge and work your way around. That forward edge kind of tucks into the fascia so you need to bend the edge just a bit to get it out. Once you do you'll see a screw you need to remove.

Work your way up and around. I ended up releasing 8 clips per side in order to not only remove all the clips that go through the fascia, but also to expose a hidden screw at the top corner "ears" of the fascia.

You'll want to stop and deal with the corner marker light and front corner parking sensors now too. GM Weatherpak connectors....pull the red clip and push a tab nearby to release the connector. I got the marker lights off no problem but quickly decided it was easier to just release the two retaining tabs on the parking sensor than to try and disconnect it.

Do it all again on the other side.

From this point forward those plastic fender edges are going to be handing out the sides of the car. They are just begging to be caught on your clothes as you brush by. Resist the urge to break them off because they're probably on indefinite backorder and just be really, REALLY careful whenever you're near them.

To give my back and my brain a rest, now it was time to stand up and work on the top of the car. I'd been here before in the fall, so no surprises. The top center front sight shield pulls straight up. Most of the clips came off as designed, but two did not, and I wasn't able to pry them off either. Worse, they go into a box structure with no finger access below. I elected (as I did in the fall) to leave them in place, and come reinstallation, I'd have to SLIDE the cover onto these two clips in order to get them to engage. I'm talking about the 2 black "towers" show on the bottom of the shield in the next pic. You can see the 4 white nylon clips that DID pull out, as well as two sheet metal friction clips.

 

Here are the two clips stuck into the box structure of the car. I've also noted some of the screws you need to start removing that hold the top of the lightbar to the car. You don't need to remove the screws that go into the "checkered" portion of the plastic. They hold the headlight shell in place and we don't need to monkey with that.

As I discovered in the fall, there is a clip missing from the factory under the RH side sight shield. None of my trim clips in my universal kits fit, but it's not the end of the world as it's well retained and secured by other clips and tabs. One day I'll try and get the proper clip to install, it's easily accessed at any time. But it's annoying...I've found a LOT of little details like this missing clip, or parts not snapped fully in, or parts shingled incorrectly since I've owned the car. It's all final assembly or trim type stuff, nothing critical, but disappointing nonetheless.

Now we can grab the corner ears of the fascia, and pull it OUT to disengage a dowel, then straight forward out the friction retainer. Keep those fascia retainers away from that painted fender from now on. Also, those plastic fender edges are still hanging there, so don't catch the barbs either.

Lay a bunch of blankets in front of the car so you have somewhere to lay the fascia. This would be a great time to grab a buddy for help, but I was by myself so it CAN be done if you're careful.

Not enough blankets. Add more. Then grab the fascia and PULL straight forward. There are two additional friction clips holding it on. Lay it gently on the ground. Be mindful of any wires, you don't want to put strain on them. More on that in a second.

These are those friction clips. They're very handy actually, as act as a guide/spotter/holder when you go to put this thing back together. Admire the back of the bumper. Top is closest to us, right where the bowtie is. No, you still can't get to it. The wiring bundle is the lightbar wiring, and behind that is the front camera. The rest of the wiring goes to ultrasonic parking sensors and forward radar. This is also around the time you question your sanity (to be fair, you've probably already done that before now) because it seems like that stupid lightbar should just come off, but it wont. Super frustrating.

 

There are two electrical connections to the front fascia. On on the RH side is a piece of coax, probably to the forward camera. The LH side has the big body connector. Probably these should have been removed as soon as the fender liners were out of the way, to avoid pulling on the wirings once the bumper was off, especially the delicate coax. But I got away with it by being careful. I expect you to do better!

Right side, single coax wire mounted behind the structural "crash bar" that is behind the bumper foam. Should be removed as soon as RH fender liner is off.

Left side, large lever-style "body" connector on lower left of fascia. Should be removed as soon as LH fender liner is removed.

Now....that stupid lightbar....let me tell you, this was the most aggravating part of the whole thing, because even last fall when I'd removed all the screws it felt like it was almost ready to come out, but was just hanging on by a little clip down below or something. Once you have the lightbar out it's a breeze to get to the bowtie. But it just won't come out! Well... after you remove the screws from above, there is a "support bracket" that kind of doubles as a cover. You can move it and bend it a lot because it's plastic, but you can't remove it because there are two screws holding it and the bowtie in place, and you cannot get access to them with the lightbar in the fascia. I say "cannot" but technically with a T15 bit and the right low profile rachet you could, and I even have such a thing, but it's clearly not what GM had in mind. They want the lightbar off first. So we have a support bracket/cover that is stuck with these two screws you can't reach until the lightbar is removed, and this bracket/cover covers what turns out to be a whole series of clips that have to be disengaged. So what you have to do is bend the bracket/cover out of the way and get a spudger in there to release the clips, and the whole lightbar will FINALLY come off the fascia. Only then can you remove the two screws the way GM intended. Yuck.

This is the back of the fascia after the lightbar is removed. You can see where the lightbar clips on, as well as some of the retaining nuts. There are many more clips than in the pic, all in a row, and they're the reason you can't get the lightbar off with the fascia on.

Here's those last two bolts that kept the support bracket from coming off, limiting access to the above mentioned clips.

Finally!!!!

Oh wait....not done....we have to pry the plain bowtie off the "plinth" (backing support structure). There are four REALLY stiff plastic tabs to pry back, and the thing is also held down with 3 sections of powerful adhesive tape. Very hard on your fingers. It's worth noting also that THIS is where the lighted bowtie instructions START.

Here's the new lighted bowtie. Also, this is the first chance we REALLY get to eyeball the new part to see if it looks like it's gonna fit. Luckily it does, although I had to supply my own adhesive tape.

Install the new bowtie into the plinth. Double check that you aren't accidently installing the OLD part (that'd suck...). Run into a new problem...the plinth is deformed where the old clips were...they won't retain the new clips properly. Consult the instructions: "if the plinth is deformed around the clips replace the plinth"... checked my plinth supply, all out...decided to search my garbage until I found some rubber strip I could cut up and jam behind the deformed plastic plinth. Perfect solution! Retains the clips, the bowtie is nice and tight, and the rubber can be removed if I ever need to get this bowtie off for any reason. Needed three rubber "plinth undeformers" but only two are shown below.

Back into the lightbar. The support bracket covers the lightbar and the bastardly two screws go back in.

 

Next the lightbar snaps back into the fascia. Click click click click along and it kind of hangs on top of the bumper. The support bracket screws can go back in some places.

Plug the new bowtie into the supplied pigtail. Secure the pigtail to the existing fascia harness with wire ties.

Add the pigtail wires to the fascia connector in accordance with the bowtie instructions. This involved a lot of fiddling around with the connector, trying to figure out how to release the terminals, remove the rubber plugs, etc. Alignment of the wires are critical, as it has retainers on two of the four sides, and is a blade pin rather than a round pin. Lock it all back together when you're done.

 

You and your buddy can now lift the fascia and "hang it" on the red retainers we saw earlier. I did it all by my lonesome and it wasn't too bad. Once again, be careful around those painted fenders, and don't get anything caught on those plastic fender edges hanging out there. With the fascia back on the car you're truly in the home stretch!

Line up the plastic dowels and clip the two corner ears of the fascia into the friction retainer and it's good and secure, and not going to fall off on you. Run the corner screws in.

Reinstall all the screws you removed holding the fascia to the car, top and bottom. Reinstall the splash shield under the car if removed. I found I really had to pull hard on the fascia to get the screw holes to line up.

As for the top underhood sight shield, mentioned earlier, I had to slide in that sight shield from the front to get it to engage the stuck clips, and after it was engaged I could push the remaining clips straight down and in.

Reconnect the parking sensors and the marker lights, being sure to pass the harness through the holes in the fascia. Install the screws at the bottom corners under the fender edge trim.

Line up the dowel on the fender edge trim as well as all the clips. Slightly bend the forward end of the edge trim to get it in the slot at the bottom where it meets the fascia. Once you're confident everything is lined up, starting at the top push the fender edge trim in and engage all the clips. You'll get nice satisfying clicks as each clip grabs hold.

Unfold the fender liners and carefully line up the flow through air duct with the opening in the liner before you install any fasteners.

Hang the front of the liner with the pushpin first, before installing any of the screws. Spend some time pushing the liner around to get it all tucked in nicely behind the fender lips, air duct, etc.

Reinstall the front tires and get the car off the jack stands and onto it's own feet. Torque the lugs to 140 ft-lbs (from the owners manual).

Sip some coffee and wonder if you forgot anything.

 

Finally, the coup de grâce:

Followed by a couple of tests

Test the car make sure all the marker lights, parking sensor, front camera, etc are all working. I used this as an excuse to drive around for a bit.

Interestingly, the bowtie lights up as part of the welcome lighting (which I never see, because my car doesn't wake up until I'm next to the fender). It also lights up during the shutdown animation, and when the headlights are on.

Surprisingly, it does NOT come on during daytime driving or during charging.

This was a fair sized job. I'm embarrassed to say I have about 9 hours in this project, at least a third of it puzzling out what is still holding what on, like that stupid lightbar, or sneaking up on the hole size of the trim tool, etc. I was content to go slow because I didn't want to break anything that I couldn't see. I did a lot of pulling and analyzing what seems to be stuck and where. I also am good at losing tools I JUST had a moment ago, and spent a long time looking for a missing screw. After getting the benefit of my experience, this could be done much faster, by me or by someone who followed along. But like I said in the beginning, consider letting the dealer do it if you aren't confident in fooling with this much painted plastic.

I think it looks awesome. The bowtie is a couple of hundred bucks even if you shop around, and the installation was a lot of work to do yourself or several hundred in labor at the dealer. It's a fun accessory, but totally unnecessary. I care not

I hope this helps somebody! Have fun!

 

Curious. Can you get to the connector by removing the the wheel well?

 

GM Bowtie Instructions here:

 

DarkDan72,
Thank you so much for sharing your knowledge and hard work with us. I don't know for what I should congratulate you more, for the hard work you did to install the illuminated Bowtie? or for the amazing write up you did. I say BOTH! you Rock!
The closest that I have done to that was to remove the fascia of the 2019 BOLT EV LT to replace a darn HID bulb (ended up replacing both ballasts and bulbs for both sides) and it was a PITA. I can't imagine doing all that AND documenting / taking pictures of every step. You are amazing!

I am about to embark into a similar project, I'll try to install the lightbar on my 2025 Equinox EV LT and from what I see I'll have to remove the fascia too (bummer!). My project is similar, I will have to run a harness from the center of the grille to wherever it needs to go. which brings to the next question.
Do you happen to have instructions or references on that harness wiring for the lightbar? I want to find and buy the harness and need to know where it goes connected on the car's wireframe.

Does your lightbar lit while driving during the day? DRL? or as your bowtie only while driving at night or with full lights on?

Cheers!

 

Extremely well done and well documented, DarkDan72. My guess is the process through post #7 applies to getting to the headlights as well?

 

Extremely well done and well documented, DarkDan72. My guess is the process through post #7 applies to getting to the headlights as well?

Yes, it looks like that to me. The light buckets are behind the fascia and grill and just the LED portions poke through the fascia. They are held on by a couple of hex headed screws with the checkered plastic. I didn't try and figure out what else held them in but if you got that far, whatever is left (possibly just friction clips) will not be a big challenge.

 

Thanks, just thinking of people who ask how to replace the headlights. Just point them to your excellent controlled disassembly process. The uncontrolled disassembly process just needs a parking lot with a concrete lamp post of course.

 

Great write up!
I installed mine last Saturday, and took lots of pics to do a write up, but now I don't have to!

A couple things I would add, suggest, etc for those who are gonna do this:

● The service manual says to remove the front half of screws for the wheel liners and fold them back, as Dan did here. I recommend to remove the liners entirely, just a few extra screws. Doing this will allow access to the back side of every clip that hold the wheel arch trim piece on.

● These clips are two pronged, which means that a simple pair of needle nose pliers will easily release them from the back side, so they don't break coming out. With the wheel liners gone, you can use your needle nose to release all of them. With the rear most two clips, you can use a screwdriver or pliers to push and release the front prong, then a hook type tool to pull and release the back prong, and walla, no broken clips even in below freezing temperatures as I did mine.

● Apply some painters tape along the fender where the fascia lines up, so when you put the fascia back on, you won't scratch the paint if it doesn't go on perfectly. Especially if you do it yourself like I did (of course I was a mechanic for 20 years, so I have more experience doing this type of stuff).

● The glowtie instructions say to pay attention to and possibly replace the plinth if deformed. Mine was toast like Dan's was, and I'll bet that is the norm. I would have replaced it, but wasn't able to get one in time, so I'd say buy one before you start the job. If you use it, great, if not then return it. I used screws to hold the tabs and lock them in place, but I'm not happy with that, and I'm not going to tear the whole thing apart again to fix it properly. So be prepared, and have one ready.

● I also made one easy wiring fix to solve one of my pet peeves on the Equinox EV. I hate how half of the decorative light bar turns off when the turn signal is on during the day. You can pretend it's to make the turn signal more prominent, but it doesn't turn off at night, so that's a mute point. The white light where the turn signal is already turns off, so that's all that is needed.

This is done at the large fascia connector through the drivers side wheel. Just connect the two decorative light turn signal wires together. One is blue-green, the other is white-yellow, shown below on the fascia side of the connector.

I also wired the glowtie power wire to these two wires so it is basically on whenever the decorative light is on, how I prefer it. I cut the blue glowtie wire (after already plugging it into the connector) and just used this wire to tie the two together.

 

Day no lights on:

Day driving lights:

Night remote start:

Night driving lights (all light on):

 

Some great information added above by LurchCamaro!

I had talked to a GM bodyshop before I did this job to hear about any gotchas. They cautioned me that only the front fender edge clips are reuseable and to only release the few at the front. I ended up releasing 8 per side, past where they had told me to stop, and I didn't see anything different about the rear clips versus the front ones. If I had known that all the clips were the same, possibly I'd have removed the entire edge, especially since, as LurchCamaro points out, it's trivial to remove the entire wheel liner. If you have the molded splash guards, they will also have to be removed to unfasten the entire liner, but again, big deal.

I actually ended up removing one of mine anyway, because I was short a screw, and I thought maybe it had fallen down inside.

LurchCamaro, you have an interesting idea with rewiring the turn signal and center lamp. For one thing, I had NO IDEA half the decorative strip turned off during signaling! Can't tell that from the drivers seat!

Are the Blue/Green and White/Yellow basically the two halves of the decorative strip?

From what I remember this lamp mod could probably be performed in situ at a later date. I'll have to give it some thought before I decide if that's what I want to do or not.

Do you have any better pics of how the center LED bar attaches to the fascia? My pics don't show that area well IMO.

Thank you for your contribution!


PS Oh, and where did you find a service manual? Is that some super-secret ex mechanic thing? I haven't found one for consumers yet.

 

Yeah, I saw an Equinox EV do that before I bought mine, and thought wow that is stupid, and thought maybe it was a lower trim. Then when I got mine, I checked against a window I was parked in front of, and sure enough.

Yes, you can do the wiring mod without tearing everything apart, just need to move the front half of the drivers side wheel liner away,and the connector is right there.

There are a few other wires for the light bar, but those are the two that control which side is on or off under normal conditions.


I have a few pics of the area where the light bar attaches to the fascia:

I don't have the "service manual" I use Alldata, which takes the official info and puts it there.

 

I don't have the "service manual" I use Alldata, which takes the official info and puts it there.

I have an AllData account also, but they don't list the EEV, at least not a la carte.

Did you email the admin or something? Or by chance do you have one of the expensive professional accounts?

 

I saw a few Equinox EVs on the road this morning. I think only the early model Equinox EVs turn off half the light bar when the turn signal is on... I saw both where one didn't turn off and on

 

Could it be related to whether the vehicle has lighting animation--2LT/RS vs. 3LT/RS? My 2024 2LT (built 4/24) does not turn off the light bar when the turn signal is on.

 

I can confirm that my late August-built '24 3RS does NOT blank the LED bar with turn signals.

 

Sounds like they decided against and changed it, I'm glad, it is dumb. Mine is a May '24 3RS build.

 

GM might have noticed this as a dumb idea or perhaps received bad feedback about it, either way that might be the reason why the lightbar was replaced. The original part number was: 86597381 and the new replacement part number is 85023318 and it seems the replacement took place at end of 1st Qtr of 2024

 

i need to replace my driver side headlight and am curious if anyone has the official instructions to do this job... does Alldata have these instructions? how much is the cheapest Alldata account that will let me access those headlight instructions?

 

LurchCamaro did say that he used AllData but I cannot find the EEV available a la carte.

It's possible he has a professional account that costs thousands but covers all vehicles; that point has never been clarified.

I would say you can expect no inexpensive official instructions.

 

@DarkDan72 - I had the front illuminated bow tie installed today at my dealership. I noticed there is some play in the emblem; it’s not super tight to the light bar (?). How is yours, and others who tackled this?

It may be worth noting, the dealer did replace the plinth.

 

I haven't done mine. But if a dealer installed it I would expect it to be as tight as the OEM Gold one originally it came with. If there is play or little lose sounds like the Plinth got some damage and wasn't replaced (?)
I have been looking for the part and haven't found the part number and / or place where they sell it, but it might be just me not putting much effort on it (yet).

Hope it is not too bad for you, but Dealers charge considerably for this installation so I would take it back to them, most probably they will glue it. A good dealer will disassemble the fascia again and replace the Plinth if that is indeed the root cause of the issue.