[N8N]

Great thread. Found that my cowl was stripped (and the flanges on the filter housing were actually cracked!) the first time I pulled it for a spark plug replacement; just haven't bothered to do anything about it yet. I was thinking of just epoxying some sheets of plastic underneath the cowl to give the self tappers something to grab to, but this is a way more elegant and robust solution. I'll probably epoxy some stainless washers to the filter housing as well to make it all proper again (I have a lot of stainless hardware kicking around in 5mm size as I also fiddle with bicycles a lot.) NiVeDh, I just emailed you to see if you have any left... Everyone else, if he doesn't, is there any interest in a round two? If there's an equivalent product at Fastenal I could get this going rather quickly as I have a location almost walking distance from my house.

The odd thing is that two dealerships haven't even bothered to comment on the holes being stripped out, despite it having clearly been done before I bought the car. So apparently "they're all like that."

Edit: just got the last set, sorry guys

Edit2: didn't see it anywhere in the thread, looked it up on McMaster's web site, for this specific insert the recommended drill size is 6.4mm or just a hair over 1/4". E size is exactly 1/4" if you have a machinists' set (but then again if you have one you probably shouldn't need me to tell you that.)

Edit3: Fastenal Part No. (SKU): 0185933 appears to be the exact same insert and is apparently available individually if anyone needs some more and has a Fastenal store nearby.