Sheared the head off a rusty bolt that held my license plate on. Looks like the bosses that hold the threads are welded on. Thought they might have been plastic tabs that i can pop-out and replace but it doesnt look like it.

Is my only option to drill/retap?

Thanks!

 

i believe they're M6-1.0 if that helps

 

It will help knowing that. Now i know i'll have to re-drill/tap to M8 or M10 lol. (if its required)

Thank you though.

 

I did the same thing to one of my front license plate bolts, is that what you're talking about? If so, there's a metal bracket that snaps into the front bumper that you can just pop out after removing the bumper. It's cake..

If not, GL.. I'm not too sure about the rear license plate/bolts.

 

Take the bumper off, lazy. You'll figure it out from there.

 

It's actually the rear hatch. Sorry i didn't specify.
Who runs a front bumper anyway?


Lazy and strapped for time are 2 completely different things. And the point of me posting this is so that i can save time, instead of taking the hatch off and realizing i could have saved myself lots of time if someone who'se experienced it before could have enlightened me. I hope it's as easy as you're making it out to be Archidictus.

 

I've never taken off the rear bumper, but it can't be that hard to figure things out, just a few bolts here and there

 

Personally when I snapped the head off one of my rear license plate bolts after a statewide plate changeover, I just drilled it out and used a coarse threaded stainless sheetmetal screw in it's place.

It's not like those screws are holding together anything vital, just affixing a sheet of metal via a couple mounts. So long as the plate doesn't get loose, it's fine. And it's been over 5 years for me, if anything it's probably corroded itself back to seizetown. Obviously the trick is matching the size of the screw to the size of the drill bit, too small and it'll get loose, too large and it won't fit.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by SlowPokeEg &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">It's actually the rear hatch. Sorry i didn't specify.
Who runs a front bumper anyway?


Lazy and strapped for time are 2 completely different things. And the point of me posting this is so that i can save time, instead of taking the hatch off and realizing i could have saved myself lots of time if someone who'se experienced it before could have enlightened me. I hope it's as easy as you're making it out to be Archidictus. </TD></TR></TABLE>

Ah...the rear bumper is slightly more difficult. You're going to remove the screws from the corners where the bumper meets the rear fenders and you're going to remove any 10mm fasteners on the underside of the bumper. Then you get the fun task of opening your tailgate at a 45 degree angle so you can get to the (probably frozen) phillips head screws that hold the bumper to the car. This part takes all the time.

Once you get it off, you're home free.

 

I just bought my 1995 Honda Civic Hatchback last week and all the bolts were caked in rust so it was a pain removing the plates it currently had.

How do I clean out rust out of the holes and prevent new rust forming when I install the new bolts? Should I get the bolts at Home Depot or are there special kinds of bolts I should buy at an auto store. What size bolts were they? The threads were so rusty that the threads flaked off. thanks.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by The Alchemist &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">How do I clean out rust out of the holes and prevent new rust forming when I install the new bolts?</TD></TR></TABLE>
When I have a rusty bolt, I normally coat it in WD40 and attack it with a wire brush, periodically respraying it. You could probably do the same, though you'll want to be careful of the paint, maybe put some rags under the hole when you're working a brush.

If you don't want to worry about brushing away all the rust, the "nut" embedded in the bumper/back plate is replaceable, you just have to remove the bumper/panel to get access to it. You'd need to order those replacement parts from a dealer, unless you luck upon a rust-free car in a junkyard.

To stop the bolt from seizing again, you probably should get a tube of anti-seize from an auto parts store and coat the bolts with it. Given that you virtually never remove the bolts, I suspect the AS would eventually dry up and rust would creep in, but... it'd still be better than not coating them with AS.


<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by The Alchemist &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">Should I get the bolts at Home Depot or are there special kinds of bolts I should buy at an auto store. What size bolts were they?</TD></TR></TABLE>
<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Bense &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">i believe they're M6-1.0 if that helps</TD></TR></TABLE>
Personally, I trust Bense. And I normally only see Standard sizes at Home Depot, but I don't go to HD very often. A dealer would definitely have (or could order) them, but obviously they could charge a lot (prices seem to vary a bit from dealer to dealer though).


Or you could do what I did, and use coarse-threaded screws. Has to be the right size though, don't want it to work it's way loose. I brought my drill bit in and bought a range of screws at HD and figured out the right size while at the car. In your case I'd bring the old bolt and use that to visually judge the diameter of the bolt vs. screw... buy a few different sizes, they should be cheap...


Modified by MonkeyBoy668 at 8:38 PM 10/12/2007

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Archidictus &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">

Ah...the rear bumper is slightly more difficult. You're going to remove the screws from the corners where the bumper meets the rear fenders and you're going to remove any 10mm fasteners on the underside of the bumper. Then you get the fun task of opening your tailgate at a 45 degree angle so you can get to the (probably frozen) phillips head screws that hold the bumper to the car. This part takes all the time.

Once you get it off, you're home free.</TD></TR></TABLE>

license plates are on the lower hatch door not the bumper