The glovebox on my 2003 WRX has been broken for over a year at this point. The failure points are the two stops shear off and then dump its contents all over the floor. I’m not sure how common this is, but it is annoying. I left the glovebox out of my car after taking my dash out so I wouldn’t put anything in it.
I thought about using plastic epoxy or JB Weld but I assumed that they would eventually break again without additional support. So the initial plan was to pass a bolt through the glovebox and the stops and then epoxy the stops in place. However, if our clearances are tight enough we don’t need the epoxy.
For our bolt, we are using a M4 x .08 x 25mm bolt that I had laying around. Add a washer to spread out the load.
Next, we need to drill out the opening in the stops and the glovebox. I used a 1/4 inch bit which was too small and ended up using a 5/32 bit. Basically, you want to make sure it is slightly smaller than the bolt that you are going to use. That way the threads can grab the plastic and function as a nut.
With our hole drilled when can start to thread in our hardware.
And then we can thread the bolt into the stop.
The 25mm length bolt is just long enough. We got lucky, I didn’t measure it at all.
And success! We now have a glovebox that won’t dump out our stuff every time we open it.
Oh, and some time ago, I removed the 5.5 lbs metal piece in the glovebox, so if you are looking for some weight reduction, there is some to be had. I try to keep the database linked below updated with new measurements.
Cheers!
B.黒曜石 