Patch Front License Plate Holes?

5475 Views 10 Replies 9 Participants Last post by flunkysama, May 4, 2004

Corey872

Discussion Starter · Mar 24, 2004

Over the past couple of days I have been taking care of some nuisance items on my Insight. Rattly glove box, streaky windshield wipers, and un-needed front license plate holder. However, I found the license plate holder is attached by three mounting bolts...one fits into a tapped hole under the bumper and two other bolts were rather crudely augered right through the bumper cover.

My thought is to find some appropriately sized snap-in plastic buttons, go ahead and drill the holes out nice, round and smooth, paint the buttons to match the retina-burning red of the car and snap them into place. But I know several owners on here are quite crafty with things like this, so I wanted to check for other thoughts / opinions first.

Anybody?

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dazey

· #2 · Mar 24, 2004

I had the same problem, but in California we have to have front plates so that meant just having to get the holder from the dealer.

The buttons would be easier than trying to patch the holes and match the paint (that could just be my thinking though since the metalic silver is a pain to touch up nicely.) Instead of painting them red you could paint them silver and put a (-) on one and a (+) on the other :wink:

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· #3 · Mar 24, 2004

dazey said:
Instead of painting them red you could paint them silver and put a (-) on one and a (+) on the other :wink:

lol - nice one.

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SeanW

· #4 · Mar 24, 2004

This is how I patched the holes in a white '98 Dodge Neon I once had:

First, I used a knife and razor blade to clean up the hole and trim down some of the "bulge" created by the screw. Then, I used white silicone bathtub caulk to fill the hole letting a little extra overflow to allow for shrinkage. When everything had set up (a day or two later), I went back with the blade and trimmed the excess caulk flush with the bumper. I then covered the repair with a liberal amount of touch-up paint (maybe even two coats) and that was that!

It looked pretty good from up-close and was hardly visible after moving 5 or 10 feet away.

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Sparky5501

· #5 · Mar 29, 2004

My thought is to find some appropriately sized snap-in plastic buttons

The Porsche Boxster has a similar problem with front licence plate holes. There is a plastic button that pops right into the hole and you can paint it to match or maybe they are already color matched. Don't know if a Porsche dealership carries them but you can find them in the Tweeks catalog. You could probably do the same with those plastic panel buttons you can get at the auto store. Just prime them with plastic etching paint then a nice coat of red Insight touchup.

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coolcat

· #6 · Apr 12, 2004

Neuspeed makes a nifty little aluminum plate that is designed to cover these holes. I think its intended for VWs and Civics, but I bet it'd fit the Insight too. Or you could just attach it so that it covers the holes. If WI didn't require the front plate I'd probably have one on my car.

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Holicow

· #7 · Apr 13, 2004

Sparky5501 said:
My thought is to find some appropriately sized snap-in plastic buttons

Click to expand...

The Porsche Boxster has a similar problem with front licence plate holes. There is a plastic button that pops right into the hole and you can paint it to match or maybe they are already color matched.

911's too.... I looked into that, and they can be found at http://www.bumperplugs.com --imagine that. Make sure you are sitting down when you check the prices.

On one of my current vehicles, I found some cheap plastic plugs at the parts store, prepped and painted them body color, with clearcoat and popped them in. Used a little silicone to keep them in place. They look kind of cool:

pic of plugs

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bjordan

· #8 · Apr 28, 2004

A friend of mine made the dealership pay to fix the holes. We live in NC and you are not required to have a license plate on the front of your car. When he agreed to purchase the car there were no holes. While he was filling out his paperwork they prepared the car. Part of that preperation was drilling holes in the front and putting a honda plage on there for the dealership. When he took it home the first thing he did was take there delearship ad off the front of his car. He was surprised to see they had literally just drilled through the bumber. Took a while but he fought them and got them to fix it.

Looks like I'm going to be getting an insight in 2 days. GOD I CAN't WAIT!!!!!!

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fizzixrat

· #9 · May 2, 2004

I'm moving from a one-plate state to a two-plate state in a little over a month. I will be stopping at the local dealership for one more oil change before I go, so I figured I'd go ahead and have them add the front plate mount for me while I'm there. Can anyone who has had it done give me an estimate of what it costs to have the front mount added to an Insight?

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Sparky5501

· #10 · May 3, 2004

It would be free if you did it yourself. All you really need is the Insight licence plate frame and hardware.

To afix the front licence plate holder to the bumper is a bolt that screws into the bumper under the front lip of the air dam. The bolt hole is in the center of the bumper overhang all the way back toward the top grill strut. You'll see it when you look under the front bumper. I think the bolt uses a 10mm socket or boxwrench (a gear-wrench works the best).

This is all my Insight had to hold the licence plate holder on. It's a tad wobbly but you don't need to drill holes into the front of your bumper.

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flunkysama

· #11 · May 4, 2004

Sparky5501 said:
This is all my Insight had to hold the licence plate holder on. It's a tad wobbly but you don't need to drill holes into the front of your bumper.

I originally tried just using the one bolt to hold the plate holder in place. It was just too flimsy for me. I tried adding double sided tape. It gave up in the cold last winter. The thought of loosing it was not too appealing, So I gave up and just drilled one small hole in the bumper and used a stainless sheet metal screw and washer to secure it. I now have no worries about it falling off.

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