darom, here is a pic of the fasteners I use. They are made by Au-ve-co for 1978 Ford inner fender to car body, sorry for the delay.They are 15mm long and the head is 15mm in diameter.

Those will work, although you may have some difficulty with the length (15mm).

At Lowe's you need to go to the Specialty Fastener section, and then go through the DRAWERS for the small envelopes of fasteners. The rivets you're looking for won't be there in bulk (or at least as of my last run there). They'll be in bags of 4 or so.

Alternatively, you might check the use of the phillips head type rivet which allows you to remove the spreading pin without losing it.

FWIW

E

darom, here is a pic of the fasteners I use. They are made by Au-ve-co for 1978 Ford inner fender to car body, sorry for the delay.They are 15mm long and the head is 15mm in diameter.[ATTACH=CONFIG]46956[/ATTACH]

wow those look preaty close to stock.

I just can't imagine why those things should cost $2 EACH. Instead, maybe we could find a plastics company to run off a large number, to offer them in bags of 50 (less pins, which you can make from 1/8 inch wood dowels.

I found the Ford retainers on eBay. I figured it was worth it to try. I'll update when I get them.

The place I get these is The Clip House in Colorado Springs, I've replaced several different types of plastic parts with some of their stuff, i.e. the nylon screw holder on the headlight pan, door panel clips etc.

Close substitutes are available from several sources including Harbor Freight with some bin searching and driving around. However, the "real thing" is readily available, doesn't cost a huge amount compared to some of the things we buy for our Zs, once in place fits right and doesn't get changed out very often, so why not just buy a bag of the real thing from MSA - unless it's the thrill of the hunt? Yes, I understand that looking at the cost per piece makes the real thing look like a rip-off. But, the fit is perfect, not just close, and they're still available. Just my 2¢, not looking to argue.

Dennis

The Au-ve-co ones I use fit well, very slightly tighter in the panel holes than the stock. The stock number is 11705 and cost is $0.38/ea.

Great. Order 87,000 and get rich selling them at $2.31 each in packs of 12

I found these on the McMaster-Cart website. They are called "Expanding Shank rivets" and is about 10 bux for a bag of 50

http://www.mcmaster.com/#expanding-shank-rivets/=dezzwi

Edited July 31, 201113 yr by TomoHawk

I got them at the link I posted for a little over $12 and that included shipping.

mjr45, tmohawk and stevej - thanks for posting the links and the picture. I am heading out to the ebay ford supplier.