Maybe a "Thing"--Maybe Not...Thick Washers for Metal Backplates

With the wonderful news of Bernie's offering of BRAND NEW metal backplates, I see bunches of old battle dogs being resurrected!

In the meantime, thought I'd show the little "thick washers" I've been making to preserve the old backplates as much as possible...maybe this has already been going on forever, or maybe nobody knows or cares, but just in case...

The mounting lugs on metal backplates have always been a concern for me.  Of course, there's the "wallowed out" trauma we all know (committed that atrocity myself back in the day), but it's also always bugged me in the way the steel mounting screw grinds down into the soft-metal face of the lug.  A lot of my traumatized backplates have had their lugs ground thin, along with being wallowed out.

It's too close for a regular washer, so I've tried grinding some down for specific use on the engines, which has sorta worked, but it's a pain for my redneck machining abilities, along with rubbing against that little bit of webbing on either side of the lug.

THEN, I decided to try putting a bunch of 2-56 machine screws on a bolt, chucking the bolt in a drill, and then grinding off their corners with my dremel while they slowly rotate in the drill.  

This is followed by drilling them out 'till a #2 sheet metal screw easily fits though.  I think this works better, giving the screw a hard bearing surface to turn against, with the lug (hopefully) just being pressed against the firewall.  I've made myself a supply to pull from.

Anyway, that's my bright idea attempt for this year!

Lugging Along Kim