Where TF did I say a marine anode was comparable to seepage? Try and follow me. What I said was that it would have to be a real sloppy hole to allow(eventually) seepage. And really, it would be electrolysis that could allow this to happen.. A properly drilled hole, smaller than the screw that goes in it, will seal just from simple physics. A screw, "forced" through a smaller hole will naturally seal from shear compression. Only electrolysis could cause deterioration of the mating surfaces.

Now before you go any further, I'd tell you that an early occupation of mine was installing communications equipment, including the predecessor to today's cell phones, as well as early installed cell phones. I probably drilled thousands of antenna holes in trunks and roofs without a single leak. I did this for almost 15 years.

 

I followed you just fine. You compared steel fasteners to a boat anode, which is ridiculous.



If you were making those antenna holes without any kind of gasket, then I'd hate to see what they looked like after a few years. Take a look at any car. Great care is taken when manufacturers mount roof racks and such on vehicles. They don't use simple nuts and bolts.



In the case of this tail light, expecting a screw to make a "natural seal" in 1 or 2 mm of sheet metal is utter folly.


I'm tired of this discussion. Go make all the leaky holes you want.

 

My work had a lifetime guarantee. Can you say the same?

 

oh yeah, only the finest products get lifetime guarantees
* rolls eyes *

 

I'll take that as a "no".

 

I see that this is quite a few years later than the original post, but I ran into the same problem. I opted to hack a solid fix without doing a hack job. Time, effort, and cost don’t justify getting too crazy with welding new mounting studs. But as it turns out, Dorman has a rivet nut and tool kit in metric. Shaved and drilled out the studs, cleaned the welded edge smooth with my Dremel, bored a hole to size (I think it was 15/32 standard), and installed the M6-1.00 rivet nuts. The ACE Hardware by me had the M6 GMC (black) body bolts with 10mm hex heads. Just add a fender washer if it’s on the tail light housing. Now I know I have plenty of threads locked on, and I don’t have to switch wrenches between the original hardware when I’m changing rear bulbs. Hope that helps.