Let us know how it works out for you so we all know going forward.
Oh you don't have to worry about that with me. Nothing more that I hate than finding a thread from a long time ago, and the person that started it never reports back. I HATE THAT.
I am not a photo journalist (lol), so you all are just going to have to deal with my worded description. lol. This is probably very similar with the door closed, but I was able to keep screwing around with the old button to get it to pop the rear lift gate door one more time, so I did that. I would put something there so the door doesn't latch again while you work on it, because there will be several up and down movements of the tailgate.
The part that I linked from Amazon above did work and fit perfect (Ford part number = 1L2T-14K147-AA). Here is how I removed it.
1. To the right and left of where the rear glass latches, there are two body plastic rivets. Pop those out. Keep the glass open.
3. The plastic panels on the rear of the lift gate are two pieces. A "U" on the top (around the rear glass), and a solid plastic piece on the bottom. Pop the top "U" first. They just pop straight back (toward the front if the liftgate was closed).
4. Remove the inside plastic handle that you use to pull the tailgate down. This requires a Torx bit
5. The solid plastic piece on the bottom of the door just has about 10 body clips. Pop those straight back (toward the front if the liftgate was closed).
6. The solid plastic piece should just go up and out (to clear the glass actuator)
7. On the bottom of the inside tailgate, there are two circles each one having a silver nut on the inside (this is what secures the handle to the body). Remove these with a deep 7/16 socket
8. Unplug the button which comes through the left side of the tailgate to give you a little room to work. Remove the handle from the door to make it a little easier, but I did it while the wire was still attached to the body
9. On the back of the handle there are 4 7mm screws. Undo those. The handle backing will separate from the painted handle.
10. Just use a flat head screwdriver to push the clips inward toward the switch while pushing it out of the housing (look at the new one and it will make sense).
11. Unplug the wire from the switch
Install the new one following the reverse directions. Unfortunately I broke one of the body clips on the solid plastic piece in step 5 (the plastic stud that the metal clip attaches to). I really don't know how to avoid that with the design. I hope this helps someone else in the future.
