There was an earlier thread today about repairing armrests and I thought it might be good to have a separate thread on my solution. I am working on a 78 restomod and the car came to me about 10 years ago with no door panels or armrests. I never thought much about them until recently as I started to finish up the interior. I got a new set of armrests and as I started to fit it all together I discovered that all 3 holes for the armrests were stripped. Trying to keep things as simple as I could I went to the local hardware store and got 6 extended U-nuts 1/4 X20 and 6 1/4 X 20 machine screws, 4 of them 3" and 2 are 2". The length isn't really important since there are holes behind the door brackets for the OEM screw to extend into. At least on my car there are. I then took a 5/16 bit and drilled out all the OEM screw holes that were stripped. That was the big gulp moment for me because if my plan didn't work, I was really in trouble. Once that was done, I put the extended U-nuts in pace. The extended part means that the shoulder is longer than the regular ones, so it can slide further onto whatever piece of metal it needs to go over to reach the screw holes. Once that was done I did a test fit with some 1/4/X20 threaded rod to line up the new armrests. They were off a good amount at the skinny part of the handle so I had to massage them in place. The OEM brackets had been bent out of shape over the years, so big persuader was called for. Once that worked I put on the new door panels and then lined it all up and put in the new screws and called out my wife for her approval. I cannot imagine these things ever coming loose or pulling out of the door. It was a little tricky getting them all aligned but once that was done it came out pretty good. Just another idea for a common problem with these cars. Total cost was about $7.20, and no Corvette tax.

 

Low tech solution to a high-tech problem. Minimal impact on the panel thickness, alignment still controlled by the original hole, lots of material behind to prevent any pull through.
M

 

I am a low tech kind of guy. My wife just calls me SIMPLE.

 

Thank you so much for this post, this helps a lot! Just hope my plastic housing on the armrest is not too messed up. would i then need to get a sleeve if there is not enough meat for a screw to grab?