backspace, I've "been there-done that". This is very easy to do, and the masts are available at your friendly Toyota Dealer. Basically, it involves turning on the radio, feeding the flexible mast track(plastic piece) into the hole, and turning off the radio, to "suck" the mast track into the mechanism. One very important thing: Sometimes the plastic will break in the motor unit. When you buy a replacement, compare the lengths of old vs. new. If the new one is longer (as mine was), it would mean that part of the flexible plastic is in the motor unit. This would have to be removed (it's no big deal). HTH

Thanks. I am just a bit worry since I can't really return the part from the dealer. I want to make sure it is the mast.

tom418:
out of curiosity how do you remove the broken plastic from the motor. Sounds like you have to remove the whole unit and disassemble the motor. If that's the case aren't you better off replacing the whole thing?

Thanks

I was able to remove the broken section on a jeep GC power antenna by simply fishing it out with a small wire bent into a hook on the end you just had to have the radio on so the broken piece part was shot up as far as it would go and not engaged in the little gear. My wife used to wack into a limb or something about once a year with the silly thing and break it. The mast piece cost about 20 bucks as I remember. Most of the time the whole piece will feed right out but one time I let the thing wave in the wind for a while before replacing and it broke off down inside a bit.

I talked to the dealer. He said the same thing. The broken part should spit out when I turn the radio on.

The new mast will be about $45. It got bended last time 2 days after I had someone put in a new antenna. This time I am going to try to do this myself or go with a fix antenna.

sdello, Yes, I took the antenna assembly out (there were thre bolts holding it in place in my Toyota Avalon, which is essentially similar to "backspaces" vehicle). There is circular cover over the area that contains the mast track which gets opened to remove the broken piece, if any. An entire new unit would have been easier, but more costly. However, as DNT1 posted, it's definitely worth trying to get the broken piece out by another method. I wish someone had told me that:)

I don't know if the unit is the original toyota since I had it repair or replace before. So if I buy just the mast, will it fit or should I just buy an entire unit?